BEGIN:VCALENDAR PRODID:-//eluceo/ical//2.0/EN VERSION:2.0 CALSCALE:GREGORIAN BEGIN:VEVENT UID:be9bf15b3f0bbfecfa37a84abe01b45d DTSTAMP:20260404T062911Z SUMMARY:historically-important-and-highly-significant-diamond-broochpendant - Date de vente : 12/11/2025 DESCRIPTION:Nom du lots : Historically Important and Highly Significant Dia mond Brooch/Pendant 歷史性及非常重要 鑽石 胸針/吊墜\n\nThe c ircular jewel featuring an oval diamond weighing 13.04 carats surrounded b y old mine- and mazarin-cut diamonds\, within an openwork border further e nhanced by mazarin-cut diamonds\; early 19th century.\n\nEmperor Napoleon I (1769-1821)\n\nKing Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia (1770-1840)\, pres ented by Lieutenant von Pless\n\nHohenzollern Family Jewels\n\nPrivate Col lection\n\nDr. Tatiana Rosenstein\, Adornment and Empire: Diamond Brooch a nd Green Beryl in Napoleonic and Hohenzollern Context – Objects from pri vate ownership\, 2025\, pp. 38-41 for the booty at Waterloo\, pp. 46-48 fo r Hohenzollern ownership\, pp. 73-76 for the jewels Napoleon received from Joseph Bonaparte and Pauline Borghese\, pp. 80-81 for the litigation of M ajor von Keller.\n\nDr. Paul Seidel\, Die Insignien und Juwelen der preuss ischen Krone in Brandenburg-Preussens Geschichte\, Kultur und Kunst in Ein zeldarstellungen und Meisterbildern - Hohenzollern Jahrbuch\, Berlin – L eipzig\, 1913\, (pp. 5-69)\, pp. 49-50 for the hat ornament and plate 12 f or the jewels associated with teh Napoleonic loot.\n\nTwo Historically Sig nificant Napoleonic Jewels from the Hohenzollern Treasury\n\nThe historica l and important diamond brooch/pendant and unmounted green beryl were heir looms of the Prussian Royal House of Hohenzollern for over two centuries\, both having a connection to Emperor Napoleon I. The former can conclusive ly be identified as a hat ornament left behind by Napoleon in his carriage when retreating from the battlefield at Waterloo. The beryl would have be en worn by Napoleon at his coronation in 1804 according to tradition. Both jewels possess an extraordinary historical significance through their pro venance of the illustrious House of Hohenzollern.\n\nNapoleon’s Hat Orna ment and the Booty of Waterloo\n\nThere are several records of the belongi ngs left behind by Emperor Napoleon I following the Battle of Waterloo whe n he fled in haste from the combined forces of the British army led by the Duke of Wellington and the Prussian army led by Field Marshal von Blüche r. As the French retreated\, their carriages got held up on the muddy road s near the village of Genappe. During the retreat\, the Prussian army capt ured and seized at least two carriages carrying the personal belongings of the Emperor including medals\, weapons\, silverware\, a hat and a jewelle ry box containing 22 solitaires and 121 small diamonds. In fact\, Napoleon is recorded as having travelled to Waterloo with diamond jewels given to him by his brother Joseph\, the former King of Spain\, the night before hi s departure from Paris. Moreover\, Napoleon also travelled with a diamond necklace valued at 300\,000 Francs given to him by his sister Pauline\, Pr incess Borghese\, when he was first exiled to Elba. In his hour of need\, Pauline proved to be his most loyal sibling giving her brother this valuab le necklace as a sign of her unwavering support.\n\nField Marshal von Blü cher recorded that he sent Napoleon’s captured hat and sword to the Prus sian King Friedrich Wilhelm III because of their symbolic value. As it was custom the jewels and valuable were considered as booty for the troops. I n the days after Waterloo\, confusion arose regarding the status of these abandoned goods and several Prussian officers took diamonds and valuables as loot which they considered their personal property. One of the abandone d carriages was later seized by Major von Keller and transferred to London to be exhibited. Furthermore\, von Keller also sold some of the diamonds in the British capital.\n\nLieutenant von Pless\, another of the men parti cipating in the looting\, presented the King of Prussia with this diamond jewel in Hanau on 21 June 1815\, only three days after the battle of Water loo. Von Pless explained his gift to the King as follows: ‘I herewith hu mbly present\, in the name of the 15th Regiment and particularly the Fusil ier Battalion under my command\, a brilliant ornament that we captured in pursuit during the glorious battle. This ornament is so rare that it shoul d rightfully belong only to the Crown of Prussia and our revered King.’\ n\nIn 1819\, the Brothers Jourdan\, the Royal Prussian court jewellers\, d escribed the jewels given to King Friedrich Wilhelm III from the looting a t Waterloo as ‘a hat ornament consisting of a button set with a large so litaire within a surround’. Two further items were also listed\, namely ‘twenty solitaires mounted in collets’ and ‘a bow set at the centre with a large solitaire’. The latter corresponds to another recorded loot ed jewel which Major von Keller had given to the Prussian King. At the tim e Major von Keller was in litigation with the army concerning the ownershi p of his loot at Waterloo and wished to be compensated for the items he fe lt he was forced to present to the Prussian Crown. The hat ornament\, alte rnately referred to as brooch or a button in records\, remained in the Pru ssian Royal collection for generations. At some point during the 19th cent ury\, the original hat pin fitting was exchanged for the present fastener\ , and a pendant loop was added.\n\nIn 1913\, the Hohenzollern family jewel s were photographed\, described and extensively researched in Dr. Paul Sei del’s entry into the Hohenzollern Jahrbuch titled ‘Die Insignien und J uwelen der preussischen Krone’. The Hohenzollern Jahrbuch was an annual publication compiling research articles on different historical and art hi storical topics pertaining to the Prussian Royal family. There the hat orn ament is illustrated as part of a suite of jewels related to the diamonds found in Napoleon’s abandoned carriage at Genappe near Waterloo. These i nclude the bow-shaped brooch mentioned above and a necklace which presumab ly was set with the twenty collet-set diamonds recorded in 1819\, together with a pair of earring surmounts\, seemingly missing their pendants.\n\nT hough the Hohenzollern family jewels are sometimes referred to as the crow n jewels\, they did not belong to the Prussian state but to the Hohenzolle rn family fideicommis\, a trust-like structure based on Roman law that ens ures the undivided transmission of wealth across generations. Following Wo rld War I when the German monarchies were abolished in 1919\, the property division between the Hohenzollern family and the German Republic was sett led only in 1926. This settlement had as its main object the family’s re al estate holdings in Berlin\, Potsdam and extensive estates in Silesia. T he jewels\, on the other hand\, were considered private property and as su ch were passed down from Emperor Wilhelm II to his son Crown Prince Wilhel m and his grandson Prince Louis Ferdinand.\n\nNapoleon and the Myth of the Hohenzollern Family\n\nThe Napoleonic Wars had an important impact on the development of Europe’s nation states. Especially for Prussia the event s of the Napoleonic wars were instrumental in shaping its future. In the l ate 18th century\, the country was a rising regional power in Central Euro pe whose standing had been greatly elevated by Frederick the Great’s mil itary successes. The Napoleonic Wars saw Prussia being almost entirely run over by la Grande Armée which ignited an urgent sense of unity amongst t he population through a common fight for survival. The end of the Napoleon ic wars brought about Prussia’s ascent as one of Europe’s leading Powe rs\, on a par with Great Britain\, Russia and the Austrian Empire thanks t o its significant military contributions. Over the ensuing decades\, Pruss ia instrumentalised both its international standing and strong newfound se nse of national identity to unify the German speaking states into the Seco nd German Empire (1871-1918). All through the 19th and 20th centuries\, th e memories of heroic battles and the brave German people fighting together in the face of a foreign enemy\, remained a key pillar of the German nati onal myth.\n\nThe Hohenzollern dynasty personified the Prussian state\, bo th in its suffering at the hand of Napoleon\, its defiance against the for eign enemy and its eventual glorious victory. No Royal personage embodied this narrative more poignantly than the beautiful and brave Queen Louise. Louise of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (1776-1810) was hailed as the most beautifu l Princess in Europe whose angelic features perfectly suited the neoclassi cal dress styles of the 1790s and early 1800s. She married the future King Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia (1770-1840) in 1793. The couple had a bl issfully harmonious marriage and were blessed with nine children. When Nap oleon invaded Prussia and occupied Berlin\, the Royal family fled to Memel on the kingdom’s Eastern borders. Following disastrous losses during th e War of the Fourth Coalition (1806-1807)\, Prussia’s negotiation positi on at the Peace Treaty of Tilsit was very weak. Queen Louise’s presence at the negotiations was instrumental in averting concessions that would ha ve annihilated the Prussian state. Napoleon was quoted as calling the Quee n ‘the only real man in Prussia’. Queen Louise’s bravery\, determina tion and defiance of Napoleon at the Treaty of Tilsit gained her much admi ration\, which combined with her tragic death at the age of thirty-four\, helped cement her image as a national symbol.\n\nDue to the importance of the Napoleonic period in the Hohenzollern legacy\, the very fact of owning jewels that were taken from Napoleon following his final defeat takes on an almost talismanic\, symbolic connotation\, underlining the dynasty’s central role in history.\n\nAn Appreciation by Vincent Meylan\n\nDuring mo re than 200 years that round piece of diamond jewellery has been kept in t he ‘Schatzkammer’ or treasure room of the Kings of Prussia of the Hohe nzollern dynasty. And during those two centuries it has always been identi fied as ‘Emperor Napoleon’s hat button’. It used to be worn as a pen dant or a brooch\, but the fact that four small holes can still be seen at the back of the setting suggests that there was an ancient mechanism to w ear the piece on a hat. In 1815\, King Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia wa s gifted the diamond button a few days after the battle of Waterloo and in a letter of thanks he wrote that he would keep it ‘as a curiosity and a permanent souvenir with the crown jewels’.\n\nNapoleon’s extraordinar y military career ended on the evening of June the 18th on the battlefield of Waterloo. After ruling most of Europe during almost 20 years\, the Fre nch Emperor lost his last battle. He had to escape in a hurry on horseback in order not to be made a prisoner by the Prussian army. He left everythi ng behind him and he was travelling in style. He had two coaches\, a big o ne ‘the dormeuse’ where he could work and sleep and a smaller one ‘a landau in berline’ in which he could travel in speed. The smaller still exists. It was seized by the Prussian and offered to Field Marshall Blüc her\, commander of the Prussian armies. One of his descendants gave it to the Museum of Malmaison near Paris in 1973. The ‘dormeuse’ which was a really big coach was seized by Major von Keller who sold it in England al most immediately. It was destroyed in a fire about a hundred years ago.\n\ nThe ‘dormeuse’ was full of the Emperor’s personal possessions: his silverware\, some of his clothes\, his numerous decorations and quite a la rge amount of jewellery. The decoration and military orders were given to the king of Prussia Friedrich Wilhelm III. They were exhibited at the Berl in national armory as soon as 1816. After World War II\, they were seized by the Russian armies who took them to Moscow where they have remained to this day. The silverware and clothes were given to officers and soldiers o f the Prussian army. Some have been kept by their descendants\, others hav e been sold. By all accounts there were also numerous diamonds in the coa ch. Some of them mounted and others unmounted. Actually\, Napoleon was use d to travel with diamonds. He was always giving presents and diamonds were the most appreciated. His court costume which he did not wear often was e mbroidered with a lot of diamonds. The famous comtesse de Boigne describes it in her memoires: ‘A jacket\, a pair of trousers in white satin\, whi te shoes with gold rosettes\, a red velvet overcoat inspired from King Fra nçois I completely embroidered in gold\, the sword shinning with diamonds over the costume\, military orders and decorations all with diamonds and a hat with feathers and a ganse of diamonds’.\n\nIt is not surprising th at Napoleon would have a diamond hat button in his coach to wear on his ha t if victory required it. In his last will and testament written on the is land of Sainte Hélène\, the ex-Emperor mentions 600 000 gold francs wort h of personal diamonds which had been taken from him or kept in the imperi al treasury which were his personal property. In his book about the histor y of the French crown jewels published in 1889\, Germain Bapst who is very often quoted and never mentioned officially wrote on page 581: ‘In 1805 \, Napoléon placed many orders (of jewellery) for his personal use. The m ain one was a ganse and a hat button. The total price was 362 060 francs. The biggest stone on these objects was a diamond of 25 carats. It was paid 180 000 francs. All these jewels were bought at Marguerite’. Many histo rians have made a simple translation of these words ‘a ganse and a hat b utton’ as if the button was always part of the ganse. But it could be wo rn and indeed sold separately. The fact that Napoleon would carry a diamon d button in his travelling coach seems highly possible.\n\nThe name of Mar guerite mentioned by Bapst is also very interesting\, especially in the co ntext of imperial jewellery. In 1804\, Bernard Marguerite took over the je wellery business of his father-in-law Edme-Marie Foncier (1760-1826). Fonc ier had always been the personal jeweller of the Beauharnais family includ ing the future Empress Josephine. He is the one who created the diamond sw ord mentioned by Madame de Boigne and Empress Josephine’s diamond belt f or her coronation. In 1804\, Foncier and Marguerite had been entrusted by the French government to estimate some pearl jewels included in the nation al treasury that Josephine wanted to keep for herself. They gave an estima te of 256 000 francs which Napoleon\, who was not Emperor at the time\, pa id directly to the treasury. The relationship between Josephine and Napole on and the Foncier and Marguerite families were rather intimate. In 1811\, Bernard Marguerite was officially declared ‘Jeweller to the crown’. H e kept this title until 1815 when the Bourbon Dynasty came back to power a nd the new king decided to give it back to Paul Nicolas Menières who had already been in charge between 1788 and 1792. It is very possible that thi s decision was decisive in the collapse of the Foncier Marguerite firm. Un fortunately\, their archives have never been found. They definitely includ ed records of many personal transactions between them and Emperor Napoleon I\, but they are still to be discovered. DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20251112 END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR