Before the hammer falls on the big royal jewelry auction at Sotheby’s in Geneva this week, I thought I’d highlight one more lot from the auction: a pair of diamond bracelets worn by a German princess who was a descendant of the Austrian and French royal families.
On Thursday, the Royal & Noble Jewels sale at Sotheby’s in Switzerland will include two jewels that the auction house is calling a “historical pair of diamond bracelets.” Both bracelets feature round diamonds set in a grid-style pattern. They’re described in the lot notes as each consisting of an “articulated, tapered band collet-set throughout with old cushion-shaped diamonds.”
No information about the maker of the bracelets is shared in the lot notes, though they’re dated to the late nineteenth century. The bracelets are an almost matching pair: per Sotheby’s, one bracelet is slightly longer than the other. (The difference is negligible–just five millimeters.) This photograph of the bracelets being worn by a model gives you a general idea of the scale of the pieces. The catalogue notes that both of the bracelets are in good condition, though they have some of the general wear associated with pieces that have been used for more than a century, including “tarnish and scratches to the metal consistent with age and wear.” Both also feature security chains as a reinforcement in case a clasp would fail.
The bracelets are linked yet again to the extended family of Tsar Ferdinand I of Bulgaria, who is the focus of the narrative surrounding much of the upcoming sale. Ferdinand, as we’ve discussed in previous articles, was the youngest son of Prince August of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (a nephew of King Leopold I of Belgium and a first cousin of both Queen Victoria and Prince Albert) and Princess Clémentine of Orléans (a daughter of King Louis Philippe I of France). Ferdinand’s birth came almost two decades after that of his eldest sibling. August and Clémentine had five children in total. Their eldest daughter, third in the lineup, was Princess Clotilde of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. She was born in France during her grandfather’s reign in 1846.
After King Louis Philippe’s abdication in 1848, the family spent a great deal of time both in her father’s family home in Coburg and in England, where her mother’s family settled in exile. Fifteen-year-old Clotilde was present, for example, for the baptism of Prince Albert Victor, the eldest son of the Prince and Princess of Wales, at Buckingham Palace in March 1864. Just a few days later, she was at the center of celebrations of her own: the announcement of her engagement to 31-year-old Archduke Joseph Karl of Austria. The archduke was a cousin of the reigning Austrian emperor, Franz Joseph, and he was also a brother-in-law of Clotilde’s cousin, Crown Prince Leopold of Belgium. The marriage was celebrated in Coburg on May 12, 1864, with many members of the exiled Orléans family in attendance.
Joseph and Clotilde had seven children together. Several of them were born in Hungary, where Joseph was head of the Hungarian branch of the Habsburg family. Their third daughter, Archduchess Margarethe Klementine, was born in the village of Alcsút, where her parents had a country estate, in 1870. Her second name paid tribute to her French royal grandmother, Princess Clémentine.
Archduchess Margarethe made a glittering marriage of her own two decades later, just a week after her 20th birthday. In the chapel at the Royal Palace in Buda, she wed Prince Albert, head of the German princely house of Thurn und Taxis. The wealthy German family received their princely title during the days when Archduchess Margrethe’s ancestors ruled as Holy Roman Emperors. The first Prince of Thurn und Taxis was the emperor’s postmaster general. Margrethe’s new husband came from an exceptionally wealthy family, and she was showered in jewels at the time of their wedding. Among the pieces that appear to have been acquired around this time are the diamond bracelets now being sold at Sotheby’s. Margrethe wears them, along with a matching diamond choker necklace (and a whole lot of additional jewels!), in the gala portrait included above.
Margrethe kept the bracelets and necklace in her collection for the rest of her life. She also retained most of the rest of her jewels from the period, including the pearl and diamond tiara that had been made for Eugénie de Montijo, who was Empress of France until 1870. (Interesting that a tiara made for a Bonaparte ended up with a descendant of the Orléans family!) The tiara was purchased for Margrethe by Albert in 1890 to celebrate their wedding. In the photograph of the couple above, taken during their diamond wedding anniversary celebrations in July 1950, she wears the pearl tiara with more family jewels.
Margrethe died in 1955 at the age of 84. Her jewelry collection stayed with her descendants, including her eldest son Franz Joseph, the 9th Prince of Thurn and Taxis, and his younger brother, Karl August, who succeeded him as the 10th Prince of Thurn and Taxis. Karl August married Princess Maria Ana of Braganza, part of an exiled branch of the Portuguese royal family, and had four children. His elder son, Johannes, is probably the member of the Thurn und Taxis family that you recognize most quickly. He was famous in the 1980s for his marriage to the much-younger Countess Gloria of Schönburg-Glauchau, the socialite who became known as “Princess TnT,” a reference to both her title and her over-the-top style.
Princess Gloria got major use out of many of her husband’s grandmother’s jewels, including the diamond and pearl tiara, which she wore on their wedding day in Regensburg. After Johannes’s death in 1990, however, she was forced to reckon with enormous debt, reportedly totaling around $500 million.
What to do? Sell the jewels. Gloria worked with Sotheby’s to coordinate the auction, which took place in Geneva on November 17, 1992. The diamond bracelets were included in that sale. In the catalogue for this year’s auction, Sotheby’s notes: “In November 1992, Sotheby’s Geneva had the honour of offering three-hundred jewels from the Thurn und Taxis Collection in one of the most noteworthy Single Owner Sales within living memory. Highlights included the natural pearl and diamond tiara from the French Crown Jewels now housed at the Louvre, an Empire-era diamond tiara and an impressive and highly important diamond-set girdle centering a bow brooch. This pair of bracelets was offered as lot 284, together with a matching choker.”
Now, the diamond bracelets are being offered for sale again, this time without their matching necklace. The auction estimate for the pair is set at 40,000-60,000 Swiss francs, or around $45,000-$68,000 USD. The sale will be held tomorrow in Switzerland. Stay tuned: I’ll have a rundown of the results of all of the pieces I’ve showcased here over the last several weeks featured as one of my articles here later this week.
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