Aviva Trivia

I have to admit that even looking at photos of the diamond kind of gave me the creeps, but at least I know never to touch it. Luckily I was never big on jewelry, but then I have to wonder what drew me to research this article in the first place??

* I went back as far as I could and all I could come up was that there was this enormous blue diamond that decorated an idol in India. And then someone decided to steal it.  That started the curse. The story goes like this. If you came into contact with it in any way, you were doomed to bad luck as the best case scenario, and death as the worst.

* It seems that twenty-three people have indeed come into contact with the diamond over the centuries. Two names that jumped out at me were King Louis XV1 and Marie Antoinette. I have to say that having their heads chopped off seems in keeping with the curse.

* There are lots of photos of this gorgeous blue diamond, and the present size is quite spectacular. But what struck me as particularly interesting is the fact that the stone was once 112 carats. And then over the years, it was cut smaller and smaller.   More about that later.

* From what I can gather, Louis XV1 was the first to cut the stone (nearly in half) so that he could create a heart shaped stone. It was later reduced to 44.5 carats. It is thought that this was done to hide the stone’s true identity.

* So okay, by this time you know that the chances are slim to none that you will ever get the opportunity to touch the stone, let alone wear it, but you can look at it. It is currently residing at The Smithsonian Institution.

* There is one owner, a lady, who took a shine to the stone and considered it her personal good luck charm. I even read one account where she checked into the hospital for a goiter operation, and she was reluctant to remove it.  Strangely enough, it seems that the owner, Evalyn McLean, did not experience anything horrific in her lifetime, but it seemed that the family members around her weren’t so lucky. Everything from car crashes, to suicides to perhaps the worse¦ her husband being declared insane! If that isn’t bad luck, I don’t know what is!

* Not sure what the story is with another owner, Harry Winston, but he decided that he could live without it and presented the diamond to the Smithsonian,  so that everyone could enjoy its beauty with none of the risks. But that is a lot of diamond history to simply give away. Has to be a story in there somewhere. Just another one of the stone’s secrets, I guess.

* If you are wondering about the price of the necklace today, you would be out of luck. Being so famous. The Smithsonian states that it has “inestimable value.” Don’t think that I own anything in that category!  Well, if I want to get soppy, I could say that my engagement ring  is worth that much to me. It is something that can never be replaced. So I guess the two pieces of jewelry have something in common after all. At least in my mind…

* In closing, I want to point out one more thing. You have to wonder what happened to the rest of the diamond. It started out as 112 carats and ended at 44.5? That means more than half of it is still out there somewhere.