This is Sleepy History. Sleepy History is a production of Slumber Studios. To listen, add free... Get access to bonus episodes and support the ongoing production of this show. Check out our premium feed. This is the Sleepy History of the Hope Diamond, narrated by Jessica Gersell, written by Alicia Stephan. Perhaps you've heard of the Hope Diamond, one of the world's most famous gems that's rumored to carry a deadly curse. Was it responsible for the demise of Marie Antoinette?
Why was one socialite desperate to sell it just weeks after purchasing it? And where is the missing piece that disappeared so many years ago? Precious stones have captured the human imagination throughout history. Finding them, acquiring them, and displaying them has been the obsession of kings and queens. thieves and merchants, and treasure hunters from many cultures. The beauty of these jewels has inspired many a legend.
We'll look into these stories and more tonight. So just relax and let your mind drift as we explore the sleepy history of the Hope Diamond. Each year, millions of visitors line up for the opportunity to tour the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History. in Washington, DC. There are many wonders there to engage even the most jaded of tourists. But one attraction remains supreme. And that is the exhibit containing the Hope Diamond.
Since going on display in 1958, this legendary jewel has been visited by over 100 million people. It's been said that the hope is the most famous diamond in the world. Its sheer size is one of its greatest claims to fame. But it is also known for its intense blue colour. The stone also shows a brilliant red phosphorescence after exposure to shortwave ultraviolet light, which adds to its beauty and mystique. That red color is due to a mix of boron and nitrogen inside the stone.
While the Hope Diamond is a household name nowadays, its origins were much more obscure and secretive. As hard as it is for our minds to fathom, the story of this remarkable stone began long before it was pulled from the earth. Its formation happened approximately 1.1 billion years ago, making its more recent tenure in the human spotlight The diamond made its debut above ground somewhere between 1640 and 1667.
There is no proof of where the diamond was mined. However, experts believe it must have been in India. which was the only commercial source of diamonds at the time. They have conjectured it may have come from the Column Mine in Golconda. India, due to its production of large coloured gems. But that's just an educated guess. There is a far more romantic and exciting tale that the first known owner of the diamond, a merchant named Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, actually stole the gem.
from the eye of a Hindu statue. As the story goes, he was then cursed by priests. These reports tend to accompany the assertion that he died soon after from a fever. However, conflicting. More boring information suggests he actually lived to the ripe old age of 84. Sadly, This is not very good fodder for the storytellers who talk about the diamond being forever cursed. Most experts believe
The diamond was acquired through a simple sale. Although the exact year of its first handoff to Tavernier is still a mystery, The French merchant left some clues for modern scholars. In his book called The Six Voyages, He included several sketches of large diamonds he had sold in 1668, or possibly 1669. The Baia was none other than King Louis XIV of France. In its original form, The diamond was the mind-blowing size of just over 112 carats.
It was said to be roughly triangular in shape and crudely cut. Tavernier described it as a beautiful violet in colour. A few years later, in 1673, King Louis requested that his court jeweller, a man named Sia Pito, have the diamond recut. One source reported that it took the jeweler two years to complete the difficult task. The result was a stone nearly half the size at about 69 carats. Immediately,
Any reasonable person would question why such a gloriously large diamond would be made smaller. The answer is that… While Indian diamond merchants valued size and weight in a gem, the Europeans sought luster and brilliance. And cutting the stone in this way enhanced those qualities. In royal inventories, The diamond was described as an intense steely blue, or the great violet diamond of His Majesty.
Violet and certain shades of blue were somewhat interchangeable at the time, and the gem was subsequently called the Blue Diamond of the Crown. English-speaking experts in later years called it simply the French Blue. According to court inventories from 1691, Louis had the gem set in gold and mounted on a stick. The effect was to simulate a golden sun when a person looked inside the diamond. This would have been in keeping with King Louis standing.
as the Sun King. According to the Smithsonian, the pin was not worn, but was stored for display in a cabinet in Versailles. Those who argue that the diamond was cursed will resume the chain of bad luck with the French king, who eventually died of an illness. But any logical person must also acknowledge that this type of passing was rather common in his time. and more likely due to the curious medical practices of the era than the king's jewelry choices.
Others will point to the fate of the King's Superintendent of Finances, Nicolas Fouquet. Some allege that he wore the diamond on a special occasion, connecting it to his subsequent fall from grace. He was accused of financial crimes, tried, and imprisoned for the rest of his life. Fictitious representations have linked him to the famous man in the Iron Mask, depicted as a heroic victim in books and film.
But there is actually no evidence that he ever wore the French blue. The much more obvious reason for his downfall was that the king felt that he was a threat to his own power, as well as making the crown look bad with his lavish spending choices. Given the context of a famously treacherous court, the modern listener can easily believe that Fouquet brought that bad luck upon himself. When the diamond passed to Louis XV in 1749, he asked court jeweler Pierre-André Jacquemin to reset it.
creating a detailed piece of ceremonial jewelry. It was meant to honor a traditional order of chivalry called the Distinguished Order. of the Golden Fleece. This pendant featured a dragon breathing flames, as well as 83 red-painted and 112 yellow painted diamonds to suggest a fleece shape. That large new piece of jewellery eventually ended up in the hands of Louis XVI and his wife Marie Antoinette.
Marie was famous for wearing many of the court jewels, but she was also fond of having them reset to her liking. The French blue was never reset during their reign, and there is no way to know if she actually wore it. Nonetheless, Proponents of the curse will point to the events that precipitated the downfall of the royal couple and blame the diamond. In 1791, the royal family attempted to flee social unrest, but they were apprehended and their jewels were seized by the government.
The next year, in 1792, Louis, Marie, and their family were arrested and imprisoned. In 1792, during their imprisonment, the crown jewels were looted and the French blue vanished. Louis subsequently met his end in January of 1793, and Marie suffered the same fate in October of the same year.
Naturally, proponents of the curse point to this unfortunate end as more proof of the diamond's dark influence. However, Students of history will certainly argue that there were a lot of other factors contributing to the execution of Louis and Marie. not least of which was a full-blown revolution. Historians and storytellers alike would really love to know what happened in the ensuing 20 years, during which time the location of the French Blue was a mystery.
Some sources claim that the diamond ended up with a Dutch jeweler and that his nefarious son did away with him to obtain the gem. subsequently meeting his own tragic end. But this story is unsubstantiated. According to the Smithsonian, There is no way to know where the French blue was for the two decades after it disappeared in France. However, what we do know for sure is that a few days after the 20-year statute of limitations took effect on the theft of the French Blue,
A smaller gem appeared in the record of a diamond merchant named Daniel Eliasson in London. Noted by John Francillon In September of 1812, this gem was only a portion of the size of the French blue, at 45.54 carats. For modern listeners, it's important to know that this was the first appearance of the diamond in the form that we all revere today. The current diamond seems so large to us that it's hard to imagine it was originally almost three times the size.
One would think that no connection could be made between two diamonds of such different dimensions. The French blue and the new stone that appeared later. However, in 2008, scientists concluded beyond reasonable doubt that the new Smaller diamond was a portion of the original. To prove this, they used a 3D leaden mold of the French blue
that was found in the archives of the Paris Museum of Natural History in 2005. The previous dimensions of the French blue were documented in drawings from both 1749 and 1789 using CAD technology or computer-aided design. Researchers were able to digitally reconstruct the French blue around the stone we now know as the Hope Diamond, adding its missing carrots. Unfortunately, nobody knows what happened to the smaller piece of the diamond. It has never been found and identified.
There is no way to be absolutely certain what path the new, smaller diamond took once it had landed on the shores of the United Kingdom. However, the Smithsonian suggests that it very likely ended up in the hands of King George IV. A mineralogist named John Moore wrote, A superlatively fine blue diamond weighing 44 carats and valued at £30,000. Formerly the property of Mr Eliasson, an eminent diamond merchant.
is now said to be in the possession of our most gracious sovereign. The unrivaled gem is of a deep sapphire blue. and from its rarity and colour might have been estimated at a higher sum. It has found its most worthy destination. in passing into the possession of a monarch whose refined taste has ever been conspicuous in the highest degree. However, there is unfortunately no royal record of the king having ever owned the diamond, so this assertion by Moore
is the only evidence that it was ever in the hands of George IV, even on loan. If indeed The king did have the diamond. It would likely have been sold after his death in 1830, as his debts were significant. The next recorded appearance of the diamond was in the catalogue of a man named Henry Philip Hope. As you might guess, This is where the current name of the diamond came from. The entry was made in 1839, but nobody knows for sure when he acquired it.
At the time of his death, it passed to his nephew, Henry Thomas Hope. Then it ended up in the possession of the nephew's grandson, Lord Francis Hope Lord Francis seems to have been a colourful character. He married an American concert hall singer named Mae Yoe. One source reported that she wore the diamond at least once. May, herself, later claimed that she wore it on several occasions and had a replica made for her performances.
Whatever the case, her husband Francis had expensive habits, and he eventually declared bankruptcy in 1896. and became dependent upon May to support him. Due to family legal restraints, He could not sell the Hope diamond immediately to pay his debts. Finally, in 1901, Lord Francis was able to obtain permission to sell the gem, but it was too late to make things up to May. Around that time, she left him for a man named Putnam Strong, who was the son of a former New York City mayor.
Francis and May divorced in 1902. Was this luck bad enough to perpetuate the claims about the Hope Diamond curse? Some would say yes, while others might shrug and consider it to be par for the course among the spendthrifts of the elite. Meanwhile, the stone was sold across the pond to Joseph Frankels and sons in New York City. However, Continuing an ongoing theme, they soon needed to raise cash as well, and they sold it to a man named Salim Habib in Paris.
Habib didn't have the diamond very long, either. He unsuccessfully tried to auction it in Paris in 1909. eventually selling it to a dealer named C. H. Rosenow. Habib subsequently met with an untimely death. But it was long after he had sold the gem. Rosenau, for his part, quickly unloaded the diamond on the famous Cartier family. It is at this juncture that the story of the jewel once again becomes rather dramatic.
Taking on a gem of this enormous value was a risk for Cartier, as it weighed quite heavily on the books. having been purchased for what would amount to about $2.2 million today. To get a close look at what might have transpired during his efforts to sell, It's intriguing to read an excerpt from a book written by Francesca Cartier-Brickell, published in 2019 in Forbes magazine.
In the piece, the author explains Pierre Cartier's motivations as he sought to place the Hope Diamond with a new buyer. She explained that, Despite the risk it would present for cash flow, Cartier believed in the importance of selling large gems. In her words, Cartier had Discovered in America, the fame and size of one's diamond was everything.
The diamond was already rumoured at that time to be cursed. But Cartier was willing to gamble that an enormous diamond with a great story might actually appeal to some people, and he had his eye on an American. Enter the character of Evelyn Walsh MacLean. Evelyn was the heiress of an enormous mining fortune. In 1908, at the age of 22, she married 19-year-old Ned McLean, whose family owned the Washington Post newspaper.
magnifying her wealth. Apparently, neither of the young newlyweds had much financial sense. Evelyn frequently indulged her passion for expensive jewels as part of the good life she and Ned freely enjoyed. Brickell quotes her as saying, The truth is, when I neglect to wear jewels, astute members of my family call in doctors. Because it is a sign I'm becoming ill. In 1910, Cartier showed the Hope diamond to Evelyn and Ned.
while they were visiting Paris. To his disappointment, they did not fall in love with it as he had anticipated they would. For whatever reason, be it the curse, the particular setting it was in, or something else, they returned home without buying it. But Cartier was determined, and he was motivated to make a sale. He tried again. so that it was surrounded by an oval of smaller gems, enhancing its impact. He then showed it to Evelyn a second time.
When the new setting didn't tip the scales, he left the diamond with her, telling her to keep it for a few days. According to the Cartier book, Evelyn put the diamond on her bedside table and it began to work its magic. She is quoted as saying, For hours that jewel stared at me, and at some time during the night, I began to really want the thing. Then I put the chain around my neck and hooked my life to its destiny for good or evil.
There is conflicting information about whether Evelyn and Ned really were aware of the alleged curse when they bought the diamond. Some sources say that it was an added enticement for them. And that Cartier played up the story. to enhance the glamorous past behind the jewel. That quote about destiny and good versus evil would support this version of the story. On the other hand, the New York Times published an article in 1911
claiming that the Maclean's had not been aware of the curse when they arranged to purchase the gem. Whatever the case, Evelyn and Ned agreed to pay $180,000 for the diamond. which would come to about $5 million in today's currency. The purchase agreement had an unusual clause. That said, it was the customer's privilege to exchange goods in case of fatality. Some might point to this.
as a reassurance against the curse, although others would say it was just good business considering the value of the jewel. Whether it was due to cold feet about the curse or just plain buyer's remorse, weeks after taking possession of the diamond, The Maclean's had still failed to pay Cartier their initial $40,000 deposit. According to Brickle, Evelyn even tried to send the jewel back to Cartier. Of course, he did not accept it.
as he was relieved to finally have gotten the enormous jewel off his balance sheet. It was not helpful to Cartier's efforts that May Yohe, whom you may recall as the singer married to Frances Hope, publicly warned Evelyn away from the bad luck attached to the Hope Diamond. in a March 1911 newspaper article. If she hadn't been aware of the curse at the time of purchase, She had to have known about it by then, two months after the sale. At this point,
The Cartier family was forced to file a legal suit in order to get payment. And the Maclean's finally gave in. To make herself more comfortable with her custody of the gem, Evelyn took it to church and had it blessed. Unbelievably, as the story goes, Lightning flashed and thunder roared during their visit to the church. According to Brickle, Evelyn was all in at that point, saying, Ever since that day, she had worn her diamond as a charm. The publicity generated by the Maclean's
seemed worth all the trouble to the Cartier family. Evelyn leaned into her ownership of the gem, wearing it often and in public. Numerous sources report that she sometimes hung it around the neck of her Great Dane dog. There are also stories that she used to hide the jewel at her parties and make a game of having her guests find it. However, like many socialites, Her wealth was not really as great as it appeared. At least once, she had to pawn the diamond
in order to cover other financial obligations? And what of the Hope Diamond Curse? Those who believe the legends will argue that Evelyn suffered from terrible luck from the time she took possession of the diamond. Although the subsequent death of her mother-in-law may not raise many eyebrows, she did also suffer the tragic loss of her nine-year-old son. in a traffic accident. Her husband Ned turned out to be, as the Washington Post once put it, more of a curse even
than the diamond. He was a spendthrift and a shameless philanderer. His behaviour was so extreme that Evelyn eventually had him committed to a mental institution. Reportedly, even after that time,
He was known to keep company with Zelda Fitzgerald. But the misfortunes went on. Evelyn's great-grandson claimed that his grandmother, also named Evelyn, was wearing the diamond when she succumbed to a drug overdose, and that the original Evelyn His great-grandmother died of pneumonia while wearing it as well. While these claims offer salacious contributions to the tale of the curse, even if true,
They could simply be consistent with the flamboyant, madcap lives of the Maclean's. Two years after Evelyn Maclean passed away, Her gemstone collection was sold to jeweler Harry Winston. For the next 10 years, Winston flaunted the Hope Diamond as a curiosity. and an attraction. Among his many uses for the gem, he featured it in a display case he called his Court of Jewels. and he also loaned it to a TV quiz show. Meanwhile, a mineralogist named George Switzer began trying to convince Winston
to donate the Hope Diamond to the Smithsonian with the goal of establishing a national gem collection. In 1958, Switzer finally On November 8th, Winston shipped the diamond in a brown paper package via first class mail. The postage itself was a mere $2.44, and it was insured for $1 million. via an additional fee of $145.29. Although this seems enormously casual to us now, Apparently, first-class mail was the most secure method of transport at the time.
The diamond arrived on November 10th and has been in the collection of the Smithsonian ever since. But proponents of the curse narrative will want to have their last word. And it must be noted that these believers in its dark powers claim the diamond took revenge even on the mail carrier. There are stories that, after delivering the diamond,
He had an accident in his truck and that his house burned down soon after. Although it's generally found at the Smithsonian, The famous diamond has done just a bit of travelling during the past few decades. It enjoyed a one-month stint at the Louvre in Paris as part of an exhibition called Ten Centuries of French Jewelry. Then, in 1965, it journeyed to South Africa for a show in Johannesburg.
The Smithsonian graciously loaned it back to Harry Winston for the company's 50th anniversary celebration. Lastly, In 1996, the Hope Diamond was briefly sent back to Harry Winston for cleaning and restoration work. Did the legacy of bad luck continue? An editorial in the New York Times in 1911 had the following observation to make. about the curse. No mention of any ill luck having befallen Eliasson, Hope, or any of their descendants was ever made.
The Frankles surely were very prosperous while the stone was in their possession, as were the dealers who held it in Europe. Habib's misfortune referred to in the newspaper accounts occurred long after he had sold the stone. As Francis Hope never had the stone, And Mei-Yowei probably never saw it. The newspaper accounts at the time mentioned were laughed at. But since then, it has been the custom.
Not only to revive these stories every time mention of the stone appears in the public press, but to add to them. fictitious incidents of misfortune as to alleged possessors of the stone at various times. With 2020 hindsight, nowadays, we have to admit that nobody seems to have stories about the curse causing trouble for the Smithsonian. Perhaps history had exacted enough revenge for former misdeeds by that time. Or perhaps the tales of the curse of the diamond.
were simply the dramatic indulgence of generations of people who sought to profit from its notoriety. If these tales have intrigued and delighted you, here's a gem of an idea. If you ever happen to be in Washington, DC, you can pass through the doors of the National Museum of Natural History yourself. and gaze into the sparkling depths of the Hope Diamond with your own eyes.