Did Queen Camilla Wear Diana’s Sapphires in Guernsey?

King Charles and Queen Camilla continued their visit to the Channel Islands on Tuesday, and Queen Camilla wore an interesting pair of sapphire and diamond earrings that echoed another famous suite of royal jewels.

King Charles III and Queen Camilla arrived in Saint Peter Port, the capital of the the Bailiwick of Guernsey, on Tuesday morning. Like the island of Jersey, which Charles and Camilla visited on Monday, Guernsey is a self-governing dependency of the British Crown with King Charles III as its head of state.

During the visit, the King and Queen attended a special sitting of the States of Deliberation, the island’s parliament. You’ll note that Queen Camilla is wearing a bandage wrapped around her ankle in the pictures from today’s visit. According to the palace, she suffered an ankle sprain yesterday.

For the events of Tuesday’s visit, Camilla wore a royal blue coat and dress that’s gotten much use of late. She wore it in June during both Royal Ascot and the Japanese state visit. On this occasion, she accessorized with some familiar necklaces and bracelets, plus her four-stranded pearl necklace with the round diamond clasp.

Camilla didn’t add a brooch to her ensemble in Guernsey, but she did wear a pair of sapphire and diamond clip earrings. The earrings feature a dark blue sapphire surrounded by a modern sunburst-style diamond cluster.

When I saw the earrings this morning, another pair immediately came to mind: the diamond and sapphire earrings gifted to Diana, Princess of Wales by the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia to celebrate her royal wedding in 1981.

Here’s a look at the entire suite presented to Diana by Crown Prince Fahd as a wedding gift. The demi-parure included a necklace, bracelet, watch, and ring, as well as a pair of earrings.

Here’s a closer view of the details of Diana’s Saudi sapphire and diamond cluster earrings. Like the ones worn by Camilla in Guernsey, the earrings feature an irregular, modern sunburst-style cluster setting.

It’s certainly possible that the earrings are the same ones worn by Diana, though I have my doubts. For one, Diana had pierced ears, while Camilla does not. That doesn’t rule out the possibility that Diana’s earrings were clips, or that the earrings could have been converted, but as a rule, Camilla has so far not worn earrings that were previously worn by royal ladies with pierced ears.

It’s true, though,  that Camilla has worn jewelry in the past that was previously worn by Diana. So far that has been restricted to just one heirloom royal piece linked to the Prince of Wales title: Queen Alexandra’s Prince of Wales feather brooch/pendant, a jewel that is now worn by Kate.

Other pieces of jewelry worn by Diana have been subsequently seen on the Princess of Wales and the Duchess of Sussex, but not on Queen Camilla. Diana kept the Saudi sapphires in her collection after her divorce. Above, she wears pieces from the set, including the earrings, for a charity gala in Washington, D.C., in September 1996. Other jewels worn by Diana during that post-divorce time period have so far appeared only on her daughters-in-law.

I would wager that the more likely option is that Camilla’s earrings are a pair similar to, but not the same as, the ones worn by Diana. It’s even possible that Camilla’s earrings were also a Saudi gift. Her collection includes a sapphire parure gifted to her during a visit to Saudi Arabia in the spring of 2006.

This necklace, worn in November 2006 for a Prince’s Trust gala, is believed to be part of that sapphire parure. The pendants on the necklace feature an interesting irregular cluster setting. Sadly, the 2006-era digital pictures aren’t particularly clear, but I wonder whether the earrings are part of the same set.

Here’s one more look at Camilla wearing the diamond and sapphire earrings today on the island of Guernsey. What do all of you think? Are these the same earrings worn by Diana, or just a pair that echoes that earlier set?