By Puja Shah Sept 27, 2019 1:25:09 PM IST (Updated)
The centre pendant comprised several pink diamonds, a large 26-carat blue diamond, a 12-carat green diamond, and the famous 136-carat ‘Queen of Holland’ diamond, even larger than the 105-carat Kohinoor!
On the eve of the momentous Christie’s auction of the Al Thani collection of jewels titled ‘Maharajas and Mughal Magnificence’, I made a trip to New York to catch a final glimpse of the pieces before they were dispersed, each making its way to a new home in different parts of the world.
An interesting observation that I made here while looking at the pieces was that though one considers jewellery to be mostly a woman’s prerogative in today’s time, more than 85 per cent of the jewellery in the exhibit belonged to and was worn by men.
I was intrigued by a magnificent turban ornament whose provenance stated that it belonged to the Maharaja of Nawanagar (present day Jamnagar, Gujarat). Since I am from Gujarat myself, I delved deeper into the Nawanagar jewels to know more.