St. Edward's Crown and You

It tickles me that most of the gemstones in the crown, St. Edward's Crown, which will be used at Charles III's coronation, are not precious gemstones in today's usage. They would be emerald, ruby, sapphire and diamond. The crown includes rubies and sapphires. But no diamonds or emeralds. 

Instead amethysts, aquamarines, garnets, peridots, spinels, tourmalines, topazes, and zircons make up the rest of the 444 stones used in the crown. These were precious stones when the crown was remade in 1660 for the restoration of Charles II to the throne of England. Cromwell, after removing Charles I head, sold the crown jewels as no longer needed. Turns out they still needed them.

The next time you go shopping for gemstone jewelry, give yourself a treat to one that's found in a centuries old crown.

à Clef currently has five of those eight gemstones incorporated into pieces you can purchase today: amethyst, garnet, peridot, tourmaline, and topaz. Use our search tool (top left) to find the gemstone you're looking to add to your jewelry collection.

Beverly Krueger

 St Edward's Crown photo by Firebrace is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.