The Court Jeweller – Page 1847

Victoria Melita’s Meander Kokoshnik

03.05.2014 by The Court Jeweller // Leave a Comment

Victoria Melita of Edinburgh (as a Russian grand duchess) wearing her kokosnik, ca. 1913 [1]

We’ve flipped the calendar over to March, which means it’s time for a new Magpie of the Month here at the Court Jeweller! This month, I’ll be featuring jewels worn by Princess Victoria Melita of Edinburgh, the granddaughter of Queen Victoria was a Grand Duchess of Hesse and a Grand Duchess of Russia during her lifetime. Let’s kick off the month by looking at one of her Russian tiaras, a piece that resides today with the former royal family of Romania.

Victoria Melita — who got her unusual middle name because she was born in Malta — was the third child of Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh (and later also Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha; he was a son of Prince Albert and Queen Victoria) and Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna of Russia. The princess, who was called “Ducky” by her family, was married twice. Her first marriage to Prince Ernst of Hesse (her first cousin, and the brother of Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna) was a disaster, and she had to wait until their mutual grandmother, Queen Victoria, died before she could divorce him. Tainted by the scandal, Ducky was a bit of an outcast in royal circles, but she ended up making another royal marriage, this time to a Romanov. Her 1905 wedding to yet another first cousin, Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich — the son of Maria Pavlovna the Elder, owner of the famous Vladimir Tiara — caused further outrage, but the pair were in love. Unfortunately, their marriage wasn’t exactly an unqualified success either, but so goes the story of so many royal marriages from a century ago.

Today’s piece of jewelry, her meander tiara, is from the time of her second marriage. Befitting a Russian grand duchess, this tiara started off as a kokoshnik. (We talked yesterday about the definition of kokoshnik — head over that way if you need a refresher!) Look closely at the photo of Victoria Melita above; you can see the thinner bands of diamonds that mark the top of the kokoshnik shape. Those bands are set atop the fabric backing that is attached to the diamond meander, or “Greek key,” design. You can even see a bit of the ribbon used to secure the kokoshnik; it’s tied in a bow at the nape of Ducky’s neck. She’s wearing Russian court dress in the photograph, which is why you can also see a veil attached to the back of her headpiece.

Appropriately, the tiara is said to have been a present to Ducky from her Russian second husband, Grand Duke Kirill. But, sadly, we all know what happened to Russian royals in the early twentieth century, so it should come as no surprise that when Kirill and Ducky fled Russia after the revolution, she sold the tiara. Ducky didn’t have to look far for a buyer. Her sister, Queen Marie of Romania stepped in to acquire the tiara. Marie was something of a sure bet for her Romanov relatives looking to unload jewels in exchange for cash; she’d lost most of her jewelry during the war, and she was looking to buy replacement pieces just as the Romanovs were in need of funds.

Even so, Marie didn’t buy this piece for herself. Her son, Carol, was preparing to marry Princess Helen of Greece and Denmark, and a new Romanian crown princess needed a suitably grand tiara. The motif of the tiara was also especially well-suited for a bride from the Greek royal family; in ancient Greece, the meander was one of the most important cultural symbols, representing infinity. The Greek key tiara was altered, turned into a flexible bandeau, and given to the Greek princess, who wore it at her wedding in 1921. Helen frequently wore the bandeau low across her forehead, as so many ’20s princesses did with their tiaras. She also wore it suspended from bands that criss-crossed the top of her head.

Carol and Helen’s marriage was, sadly, just as disastrous as Ernst and Ducky’s had been a generation earlier. But their son, Michael, did end up reigning as Romanian king before finally being compelled to abdicate in 1947. Even though he lost his throne, his family was able to retain this tiara. His wife, Princess Anne of Bourbon-Parma, wore the tiara to their wedding in 1948. Their daughter, Princess Maria, also wore the tiara at her wedding in 1995. Today, the piece is worn most frequently by Michael and Anne’s eldest daughter, Margarita. She often represents her father at European royal events, giving her plenty of opportunities to show off the family’s only remaining heirloom tiara.

NOTES, PHOTO CREDITS, AND LINKS

1. Cropped version of photograph available via Wikimedia Commons; source here.

Jewelry 101: Kokoshnik

03.04.2014 by The Court Jeweller // Leave a Comment

Kokshnik tiara worn by Marie Feodorovna of Russia [1]

Jewelry 101: Kokoshnik

This is the second installment of a series that provides information on various unusual terms associated with the world of royal jewelry. To catch up, visit our discussion of the term “parure” here.

Of all the questions I’m asked about royal jewels, and tiaras in particular, there are few I get as often as this one: what exactly is a kokoshnik? With so many kokoshniks in royal collections today, it’s a specialized term that gets used quite a bit.

Russian kokoshnik, ca. 1900 [2]

The word “kokoshnik” is translated from Russian. It originally referred to a headdress worn by married Russian women in certain parts of the country. These traditional kokoshniks varied a bit in size and shape. Some of them were gigantic — see the photograph at left — while some were smaller. In general, however, kokoshniks shared the same basic crescent shape. Many of them were secured at the back of the head by a ribbon.

Kokoshiks became popular in the world of royal jewels when the Romanov court began to wear them in the nineteenth century. Russian tsarinas and grand duchesses adapted the European fashion for tiaras, which had become fashionable at the court of Napoleon in France, to fit with these traditional Russian headdress shapes. In the hands of the Romanovs, the large kokoshnik headdresses that were a part of the traditional dress of many Russian peasants generally became smaller, crescent-shaped headpieces that resembled halos.

Grand Duchess Anastasia [3]

The Romanovs embellished their kokoshniks with jewels; sometimes they attached stiff fabric backings to tiaras to achieve the desired shape, and sometimes they had tiaras made that echoed the shape of kokoshniks, with no fabric needed to supplement the piece. In the detail of the portrait at the top of this post, you can see the way that a row of pearls was affixed to a diamond fringe tiara worn by Tsarina Marie Feodorovna in order to mimic the crescent shape of kokoshniks. Unmarried Russian grand duchesses, like the four daughters of Tsar Nicholas II, frequently wore simple fabric kokoshniks without major jewels, although they were sometimes adorned with pearls (see the photograph of Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna at right). When wearing court dress, many grand duchesses supplemented their kokoshniks with veils.

The kokoshnik-style tiara became popular throughout Europe in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries in part because of the various family ties that the Romanovs had with members of other royal houses. Tsarina Marie Feodorovna’s sister, Queen Alexandra of the United Kingdom, requested a tiara shaped like one of her sister’s kokoshniks as an anniversary gift in 1888. That kokoshnik tiara, made of diamonds set in white and yellow gold, is still worn today by her great-granddaughter, Queen Elizabeth II [4]. Other royal and noble families, including the Bernadottes in Sweden and the Rosenborgs in Denmark, also have kokoshnik tiaras that were inspired by those worn at the Romanov imperial court.

Olga of the Hellenes [5]

European tiara collections today still include many examples of kokoshnik-shaped tiaras, largely because so many grand duchesses married into various royal families. Queen Olga of the Hellenes, who was born Grand Duchess Olga Constaninovna of Russia, brought an emerald-studded kokoshnik (see the photograph at right) with her to her new country. Although the family has altered the tiara over the years, its current incarnation echoes its original kokoshnik shape. Many Russian grand duchesses received diamond fringe tiaras, which mimicked the shape of kokoshnik headdresses, as a part of their wedding trousseaux; you can see some of those fringe tiaras gracing the heads of their descendants today in countries like Denmark (inherited from Grand Duchess Anastasia Mikhailovna) and Germany (inherited via two Romanovs, Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna and Grand Duchess Elena Vladimirovna). These halo-esque fringe tiaras were sometimes called tiaras russe because of their links to the Romanovs.

After the Russian revolution of 1917, kokoshnik tiaras were also frequently purchased from the Romanovs by other royals. Queen Marie of Romania bought an impressive Cartier sapphire and diamond kokoshnik tiara from her aunt, Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna (“the Elder”) of Russia; it stayed with the Romanian royals until Queen Marie’s daughter, Princess Ileana, sold it in exile in the 1950s. Alexander I of Yugoslavia bought a diamond and emerald kokoshnik for his new wife, Princess Maria of Romania, in 1922; it had originally been made for Grand Duchess Elisabeth Feodorovna, one of the Romanovs who was murdered by the Bolsheviks, and was sold to the Yugoslavian king by her niece, Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna (“the Younger”).

So, to identify a kokoshnik tiara in the wild today, ask yourself a couple of simple questions. Is it shaped like a halo or a half-moon? Does it have a distinctively curved top? Is it associated with Russia, or was it Russian-inspired? If you can answer “yes” to any of those questions, it’s highly likely that you’re looking at a kokoshnik. Which royal kokoshnik tiaras are among your favorites?

NOTES, PHOTO CREDITS, AND LINKS

1. Detail of Ivan Kramskoi’s Portrait of Maria Fyodorovna (ca. 1880s); source here.
2. Photograph available via Wikimedia Commons; source here.
3. Photograph available via Wikimedia Commons; source here.
4. More on Queen Alexandra’s kokoshnik tiara can be found at the Royal Collection website.
5. Detail of photograph available via Wikimedia Commons; source here.

Jewel History: The Khedive’s Jewels (1891)

03.03.2014 by The Court Jeweller // Leave a Comment

Wedding of Lieutenant Thomas Fitch and Miss Maria Sherman [1]

“The Khedive’s Jewels”

(originally appeared in the New York Times, 3 March 1891)

Mrs. Fitch, wife of Lieut. T.W. Fitch, née Sherman [2], gave some interesting details today concerning the proposed sale of the famous Khedive jewels, presented to her by the Egyptian ruler [3] upon her marriage fifteen years ago.

Mrs. Fitch denied that her reasons for disposing of the diamonds were in any way influenced by her husband’s misfortunes in connection with the Braddock Wire Company, as has been reported. She was controlled entirely by circumstances of no interest to the public. Besides, Mrs. Fitch said, the Lieutenant’s withdrawal from the Braddock Wire Company did not leave him financially embarrassed. His action was compelled by the formation of another company in which he is largely interested to build a second wire works at Braddock. This enterprise is now well under way.

Concerning the Khedive diamonds, Mrs. Fitch said negotiations for their disposal were already under way. The death of her father [4] had nullified a promise made directly on the receipt of the jewels, an agreement that the diamonds were never to be transferred from the keeping of the family while Gen. Sherman lived. The diamonds, although given absolutely to Mrs. Fitch, were divided soon after their receipt into four equal shares, being given to Mrs. Fitch; Mrs. Lieut. Thackara [5]; Father Thomas Ewing Sherman [6], the Jesuit priest; and P.T. Sherman [7], member of the law firm of Evarts, Choate & Co. of New York, the four children of Gen. Sherman. Each part footed up in value to nearly $35,000, the whole collection equaling a sum little less than $135,000.

Although appreciating highly the honor in the gift bestowed upon the family through her father’s military greatness and the prestige given the owner of the famous jewels, Mrs. Fitch said the whole collection would probably soon pass out of the keeping of the Sherman family. She herself a few weeks ago authorized a relative in New York City to place upon the market, through a jeweler, her share of the diamonds. Mrs. Thackera has made known a similar desire, but no intimation of the intention of the two male members of the family has been given.

NOTES, PHOTO CREDITS, AND LINKS
1. Detail from an engraving by H.A. Ogden of the 1874 wedding of Lieutenant Thomas W. Fitch and Miss Maria Sherman; image originally published in Leslie’s in 1874; source here.
2. Maria “Minnie” Ewing Sherman (1851-1913) was the eldest child of General William Tecumseh Sherman and Ellen Boyle Ewing. Her husband, Thomas W. Fitch, was a naval lieutenant during the American Civil War; later he became involved in the steel trade. You can read his 1915 obituary here.
3. The reigning khedive at the time of Minnie’s wedding was Isma’il Pasha (1830-1895). His grandson, Abbas II, continued the family tradition of bestowing lavish diamond wedding gifts on prominent brides when he gave Princess Margaret of Connaught a diamond scroll tiara in 1905.
4. General Sherman died on 14 February 1891, only a few weeks before this article was published.
5. Eleanor “Ellie” Sherman (1859-1915) was the fifth child of General Sherman; she married Alexander Montgomery Thackera, a naval lieutentant, in 1880.
6. Thomas “Tom” Ewing Sherman (1856-1933) was the fourth child of General Sherman. He was ordained as a Jesuit priest in 1889.
7. Philemon Tecumseh “P.T.” Sherman (1867-1941) was the youngest child of General Sherman.