Diamonds Of Fate

Louis Kornitzer's book, Gem Trader, is partly autobiographical and partly woven round the lore of pearls. It's educational + explains the distribution chain of gems, as they pass from hand to hand, from miner to cutter, from merchant to millionaire, from courtesan to receiver of stolen goods, shaping human lives as they go + the unique characters in the industry.

(via Gem Trader) Louis Kornitzer writes:

One of the greatest gems of the world was the ‘Great Mogul’. Only a particularly magnificent piece is worthy of such a title, and in every way it was worthy of its name.

It was called after Shah Jehan, the fifth in succession to Baber, founder of the so-called Mogul Dynasty in Hindustan. We have a description of the stone from the pen of one who was singularly well qualified to speak, for not only was he an intrepid traveler, one of the world’s foremost dealers in precious stones in his generation, but also he was gifted with a flair for the uncommon, the rare, the exquisite. This was the Frenchman Tavernier, supplier of gems to the ‘Roi Soleil’, Louis XIV. Tavernier gives the weight of the Great Mogul as 319½ carats, which corresponds to 280 European carats, because the rati or Indian carat was only seven-eighths of our own carat weight. In shape it is said to have been round, rather high on one side and of the cut called rose cut, which I have already described.

We know from the records that have come down to us that a certain Hortensio Berghis, a diamond cutter, was commissioned to facet the stone, but that he bungled the work in such a manner that instead of receiving a wage for his labors he was fined 10000 rupees. Shortly after Tavernier saw the gem, in the middle of the seventeenth century, it apparently disappeared from history like so many of the big diamonds of the old days. And yet perhaps its whole tale is not told. According to at least one expert, the ‘Orloff’ diamond, part of the present Russian State treasure, is none other than the Great Mogul.

The story of the so-called Orloff diamond—from the European point of view—begins only in the eighteenth century with one of those thefts which are still so popular as the background for thrillers. It was part of the temple treasure, the eye of a Buddha (not quite the green eye of the little yellow god, but near enough), and a French soldier, dressing himself up a worshipper, managed to steal it. He sold it to an English sea captain at Madras for two thousand pounds, and the sailor sold it in London for three times as much as he gave for it. Finally it reached Amsterdam and was bought by the Russian Prince Orloff for the then stupendous sum of a million and a half florins, almost a hundred thousand pounds. Orloff, who was in disfavor with his queen, Catherine II, bought the gem in order to present it to the Russian Throne, and it now adorns the Imperial sceptre of an Empire which has no use for Emperors. In its present cut state it weighs 193 carats, whereas the Great Mogul’s weight was given as 319½, but this discrepancy might be accounted for by the wastage in the cutting process.

More convincing is the identification of the Kohinoor with the Great Mogul. Except for the fact that the Kohinoor has a history which goes back to the remotest times, a history of blood, rapacity, cruelty, during which period the gem changed hands many times, but never for gold, there might be some color in such a tale. It too is linked with Baber, the great Mogul, who owned it, and when it came to England (to be presented to Queen Victoria on June 3rd, 1850) its weight was then either 186 or 193 carats. The weights are variously given by the authorities I have consulted. That did not prove it had no connection with the other stone, for it is suggested that it might be only a portion of the lost diamond. We are here confronted with a great mystery, however, to which I can add nothing.

The weight of the Kohinoor was reduced by recutting to a mere 106½ carats. Voorsanger was the cutter’s name, a Dutch master of craft who was employed by a Mr Costers. The work was done at the rooms set apart for the restoration of Crown Jewels in London, and the supervisor was Mr Sebastian Garrard, the cost of recutting being £8000. An amusing story is told by an acquaintance of Mr Robert Garrard, another member of the superintending firm.
‘When I met him (Robert Garrard), I said to him: ‘What would you do if the Kohinoor burst?’
‘I would take off my name-plate and bolt,’ he replied.

In the year 1853 a negress was at work at a mine in the province of Minas Gerais, in Brazil, when she dug out of the soil a diamond weighing 254½ carats in the rough. To this gem the name ‘Star of the South’ was attached. The black woman was probably none of the richer for her discovery, but the stone was acquired by a syndicate and subsequently founds its way into the treasure chamber of the Gaekwar of Baroda, who paid £80000 for it. In its cut state, being of oval shape, it turned the scale at 125 carats.

This Indian potentate eventually lost his throne through diamonds. He was rather too fond of prescribing powdered diamonds for those of his subjects who could not see eye to eye with him, and had indeed tried his panacea on the then British resident, Colonel Phayre. A specially commissioned tribunal appointed by the British Government sat on the matter, and having found him guilty, deposed him.

Another brilliant from Brazil, the ‘Pitt’ or ‘Regent’, has an interesting history. It was found as far back as 1701 in the Parteal mines on the Kistna. In the rough state it weighed 410 carats, but cut only 136¾ carats.

The story goes that the slave who found it made a wound in his calf in which to conceal the stone, but another version has it that he merely pretended to be hurt and concealed the stone beneath a bandage. He made his bid for liberty and jumped an outgoing ship, but unfortunately for him he told his story to the captain, who is said to have thrown the fellow overboard after making sure of the gem. Subsequently he sold it for £20000 to Thomas Pitt, Governor of Fort St.George, dissipated the proceeds and hanged himself in a fit of delirium tremens. The stone was offered to the Duke of Orleans in 1717 at a time when Louis XV was still a minor and the Duke his Regent. The price was £135000.

A modern stone without a long and bloody history is the ‘Porter-Rhodes,’ a blue-white diamond from Kimberly, which was found in 1880 and weighed in the uncut state 150 carats. Its original owner proudly claimed that for quality this stone had no rival in the world. Porter-Rhodes, when he visited England, had an audience with Queen Victoria for the purpose of showing her this splendid gem. When she saw it she was surprised, for she confessed she had been under the impression that South Africa produced only yellow diamonds.