Certification
- Gemological Institute of America Diamond Grading Report no. 5151344760, dated December 3, 2013, stating the 23.15-carat cushion brilliant diamond is D color and internally flawless clarity.
- Gemological Institute of America Diamond Type Classification for Diamond Grading Report no. 5151344760 stating that the 23.15-carat cushion brilliant diamond has been determined to be a type IIa diamond. “Type IIa diamonds are the most chemically pure type of diamond and often have exceptional optical transparency.”
- Gemological Institute of America Monograph stating, “Gazing into the precise, sparkling facets of the Legend of Golconda Diamond, it is clear to spectators that what sits before them is no ordinary work of nature . . . the Legend of Golconda’s exceptional purity evokes the spirit of the ancient Kingdom of Golconda and the treasures it produced. The diamond’s antique cushion shape honors the natural form of its rough, while its brilliant cut enhances its natural sparkle to capture all eyes.”
Significance
For any jewelry connoisseur, the name Golconda evokes the richness and mystery of the legendary gems, superb in quality and transparency, discovered in the world’s earliest and richest diamond mines. First discovered in 400 B.C.E., this area in Eastern India quickly became known for producing spectacular stones, a distinction that remained true for two thousand years. In the thirteenth century, the Venetian explorer Marco Polo wrote, “No country but this [India] produces diamonds. Those which are brought to our part of the world are only the refuse, as it were, of the finer and larger stones. For the flower of the diamonds are all carried to the great Khan and other kings and princes of the region. In truth they possess all the treasures of the world.”
In the seventeenth century, renowned French diamond merchant and author of The Six Voyages, Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, returned from India with enough Golconda diamonds to merit a barony from King Louis XIV. Included in the diamonds acquired by the king was the French Blue, which Tavernier described as, “of the finest water,” referencing the gem’s unrivaled and extraordinary transparency.
Within a century after Tavernier’s visit, the Golconda mines were depleted, but they had yielded some of the most beautiful and illustrious diamonds ever unearthed including The Hope, gifted by Harry Winston to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.; the Koh-i-Noor, now part of the British Crown Jewels, mounted in the Queen Mother’s crown, in The Royal Collection at the Tower of London; and The Regent, considered the finest diamond in the French Crown Jewels, at the Musée du Louvre in Paris.
Now dormant, the importance of the Golconda mines in the history of diamonds is unparalleled. Large diamonds from this source and distinction are seldom seen today and even more rare and desirable are stones maintaining their original cut. The Legend of Golconda, a 23.15-carat cushion brilliant diamond, is a superb example of a Golconda diamond.
