Natural pearl and diamond pendant from the collection of royal jewels from the Bourbon-Parma family, estimated at SFr1m-2m in Sotheby’s Geneva auction on November 14.
It’s a story told in sensational style through the collection of royal jewels from the Bourbon-Parma family that will be sold by Sotheby’s in Geneva this week (November 14).
The jewels, more than 100 lots, chart the saga of a dynasty that connected the most powerful ruling families of Europe. It includes this natural pearl and diamond pendant that was among the jewels packed up on a frantic night in the Palace of the Tuileries in 1791, as a beleaguered royal family prepared to escape from France.
The jewels, wrapped in cotton and packed in a wooden box, were sent secretly to Brussels, and from there to Vienna, into the safekeeping of the emperor, Marie-Antoinette’s nephew.
The estimate is SFr1m-2m.
