Diamonds have been the ultimate symbols of romance and luxury for over a century. While several other gemstones have come and gone out of vogue, diamonds are forever. Here are 20 of the world’s most famous and most valuable diamonds along with their stories.
List of Famous Diamonds
| 1. The Kohinoor | 8. The Sancy | 15. The Blue Oppenheimer |
| 2. The Blue Hope | 9. The Dresden Green | 16. The Pink Star |
| 3. The Cullinan Diamonds | 10. Daria-i-Noor | 17. The Orange |
| 4. The Regent | 11. The Princie | 18. The Heart of Eternity |
| 5. The Orlov | 12. The Allnatt Diamond | 19. The Perfect Pink |
| 6. The Idol’s Eye | 13. The Graff Venus | 20. Wittelsbach-Graff Diamond |
| 7. The Taylor-Burton | 14. The Centenary |
The Kohinoor
The Koh-i-Noor, which means the ‘Mountain of Light’ is the most famous diamond in the world. It is a transparent diamond that weighs a staggering 105.6 carats. The diamond has exchanged hands many times, primarily because of a belief that those who possess the Kohinoor could not be vanquished.
Ironically, kingdoms faced attacks primarily for this very famous diamond. The Persian invader Nadir Shah looted it along with the Peacock Throne. In 1849, The East India Company took possession of the diamond during the Sikh Wars. The company then presented it to the Queen during its 250th Anniversary festivities in 1850. It is now the center stone of the Queen Mother’s Crown.
The Blue Hope
The 45.52 carat steely blue diamond has uncertain origins and a sinister history. In fact there was a belief that the “hope” diamond has some sort of a curse. Lord Francis Hope inherited the diamond and sold it after he involved himself in gambling heavily. Thereafter, a string of tragedies followed. The next owner Jacques Colot became mentally ill and committed suicide.
Yet another owner, Prince Ivan Kanitowsky gifted the diamond to the actress Folies Bergère, who lost her life to a gunshot the very first time she wore the diamond. The prince himself did not live long after and the revolutionaries killed him. American Mining heiress Mrs. Evalyn Walsh McLean was the last private owner of the Hope diamond. While she did not believe in the curse she too faced a string of tragedies. Her 9-year-old son died in a car crash, her alcoholic ex-husband died in a mental institution and her 25-year-old daughter died of a drug overdose. Mrs. McLean died of grief.
The Cullinan Diamonds
The Cullinan was the largest gem quality rough diamond. At the time of its discovery in South Africa in 1905, it weighed an astonishing 3,106.75 carats. The diamond received its name after Thomas Cullinan who was the Chairman of the mine. The diamond is now a collection of 105 diamonds of various cuts. Cullinan 1, also known as ‘Great Star of Africa’ is the largest among them (530.4 carats) and is mounted on the sovereign’s scepter.
The Regent
The Regent is one of many famous diamonds found and looted by the colonizers in the Indian subcontinent. Found in Golconda, this light blue gemstone originally weighed a staggering 410 carats. The Regent’s first owner, British Prime Minister William Pitt had it shaped into a cushion cut diamond.
The Regent exchanged hands amongst a number of European royals and it also went missing briefly in 1792. But very soon it was discovered again. It was set into the hilt of Napoleon’s sword and the crown of Marie Antoinette. It is now a 140.50 carat diamond and is on display at the Louvre in Paris.
The Orlov
A great mystery has always shrouded the history of the Orlov or Orloff diamond. Though the origin of the gem lies in Golconda, India, no one knows about its original owners. Legend has it that the Orlov was the third eye of a deity’s statue in a South Indian Hindu temple and a French soldier stole it from there.
The gemstone found its way to Europe and received its name after Count Grigori Grigorievich Orlov. Mr. Orlov was a Russian nobleman and army officer who had romantic involvement with Catherine The Great. The stone later found its place onto the Russia’s Imperial Scepter.
The Idol’s Eye
Like the Orlov, the idol’s eye was also believed to have been stolen from the statue of a deity in Golconda in the 17th Century. Legend also states that the diamond exchanged hands between the King of Kashmir and the Sultan of Turkey as ransom for a princess whom the Sultan kidnapped.
In 1865, it was auctioned at Christies at London and acquired by the 34th Ottoman Sultan, Abd al-Hamid II. The Sultan’s identity remained concealed for a long time. The Idol’s eye was once again shrouded in mystery till it reappeared after the second world war. Mrs. May Bonfils Stanton is one of its most famous owners. As per some accounts the Heiress wore it to her solitary breakfast every day.
The Taylor-Burton
The famous Taylor-Burton diamond is a relic from one of Hollywood’s most beloved couples. The pear-shaped diamond weighs 69.42 carats and was a gift by Richard Burton to his fifth wife, Elizabeth Taylor. The gemstone was auctioned in New York and bought by Cartier for a sum of $1,050,000. The stone subsequently received the rename the Cartier Diamond. But only a day later, Richard Burton bought the same for an undisclosed amount.
Elizabeth Taylor Famously wore the diamond as a pendant at a party celebrating the 40th birthday of Princess Grace of Monaco. After her divorce from Burton, Elizabeth Taylor sold the diamond for $5 million in 1979 to build a hospital in Botswana, Africa.
The Sancy
The Sancy is a pale-yellow-colored diamond that weighs 55.23 carats. It comes from an even larger diamond called the Balle de Flandres. Over time many famous royals owned The Balle de Falndres such as Louis I, Duke of Orleans, Henry III of France, King Manuel I of Portugal, Henry IV, and King James VI, Charles I and James II.
The sancy diamond got its name from Nicolas de Harlay, seigneur de Sancy who was a French diplomat and jewelry collector. Today, The Sancy diamond along with the Regent Diamond is on display in the Apollo Gallery.
The Dresden Green
The Dresden Green is a 41 carat egg-shaped apple green colored-diamond. It is the largest diamond of its kind. It is originally from India but Augustus III of Poland acquired it from a Dutch merchant in 1742.
The diamond was set as the center stone of an extremely elaborate and valuable hat ornament which also features approximately 400 small white diamonds. After World War 2, Russians got possession of the Dresden diamond but they returned it in 1958. It is on display in the Dresden Castle, Germany.
Daria-i-Noor
Weighing approximately 182 carats, The Daria-i-Noor is a pale pink tabular cut diamond famous for its rare color and size. Daria-i-Noor means the ‘Sea of light’ in persian. The Diamond was mined from Kollur in India and originally owned by the Kakatiya dynasty.
It usually remained in the possession of whoever laid control on the throne of Delhi. Shah Jahan had it installed in the Peacock Throne. Later, Nadir Shah looted the throne along with the Kohinoor. After Leaving the Indian subcontinent, the Diamond found its way to the rulers of the Qajar dynasty. Today, the diamond is part of the Iranian Crown Jewels collection of the Central Bank of Iran in Tehran.
The Princie
This one of the very famous diamonds came from Golconda Mines in India over 300 years ago. The Princie has an intense pink color and takes on an orange hue under ultraviolet light. It weighs approximately 36.65 carats. The diamond received its name after Sayajirao Gaekwad who was the son of the Maharani of Baroda, Sita Devi. In 2013, Christie’s sold the gemstone for $39.3 million in an auction.
The Allnatt Diamond
The Alnatt is a 101.29 carat fancy yellow diamond from the De Beers Premier Mines of South africa. It gets its name after the English businessman and art collector Major Alfred Ernest Allnatt.
Colored diamonds that weigh over a 100 carat are hard to come by. The Alnatt is one the largest and most famous natural yellow color diamonds in the world. Major Alnatt had it placed in a flower setting. In 1996, it was again Christie’s that sold it for over 3 million dollars in an auction.
The Graff Venus
In 2016, this 118.78 carat heart-shaped flawless diamond received recognition for being the largest of its kind. It was unearthed in 2015 at the Letseng mine of Lesotho, Africa which is famous for it’s unusually large diamonds.
Due to the overwhelming size of the rough stone Graff developed special tools to cut the Graff Venus into the flawless heart-shaped beauty it is today.
The Centenary
Technology played a crucial role in the discovery of this now famous diamond. The use of electronic X-ray imaging system revealed this diamond in the Premier Mine in South Africa in July 1987. Its discovery coincided with the 100-year anniversary of the De Beers Consolidated Mines, thereby giving the name Centenary Diamond.
In its rough state, the diamond resembled a matchbox with sharp planes and an irregular protrusion in a corner along with a deep concave on one large surface. There was no obvious way to cut this complex shape and it took 3 years and various methods to make the centenary into the brilliant diamond it is today.
The Blue Oppenheimer
This famous diamond is a 14.62 carat vivid blue, emerald cut beauty sgining atop a ring with a platinum shank and two trapeze shaped diamonds on either side. In 2016 it set the record as the most expensive diamond ever to be auctioned.
However, the record didn’t last long and in 2017, the Pink Star diamond broke it. The diamond received its name after its former owner, Sir Philip Oppenheimer who was a British diamond dealer and collector.
The Pink Star
Formerly known as the Steinmetz Pink, The Pink star is a Fancy vivid Pink diamond weighing 59.6 carats. The De Beers Corporation mined it in South Africa in 1999.
In it’s rough state, the stone weighed 132.5 carats. The famous Steinmetz Diamonds Group faceted it over a period of 20 months. It is currently on display at the “The Splendor of Diamonds” exhibit at the Smithsonian.
The Orange
The Orange lives up to its name since it exhibits orange color. It’s a pear-shape natural diamond weighing 14.82 carats. Orange Diamonds are extremely rare and get their color due to trace amounts of nitrogen in their chemical composition.
The Orange is the largest orange color fancy diamond and it is one of its kind. Christie’s auctioned this diamond in 2013, in their Geneva Magnificent Jewels Sale. It fetched $35.5 million, cementing its position in the list of world famous diamonds.
The Heart of Eternity
The Heart of eternity is a fancy vivid blue diamond that weighs 27.64 carats. Once again it was the Premier Mines in South Africa, famous for its blue diamonds, yeilded this diamond. The Steinmetz Group gave the diamond its heart shape and later De Beers bought this diamond.
In the year 2000, it was almost stolen in the Millennium Dome diamond heist in London, but fortunately, the Metropolitan Police saved the day. Today, no one knows who owns the heart of eternity.
The Perfect Pink
The Perfect Pink is a rare vivid pink diamond. It features an emerald cut and two clear diamonds on both sides. It weighs 14.23 carats and in 2010 it was one of only 18 pink diamonds appearing at auction to weigh more than 10 carats. Out of those 18, The Perfect Pink was the only one to receive the grading of Fancy Intense Pink by the Gemological Institute of America (GIA).
It closed for $23.17 million at the Christie’s Hong Kong auction in 2010. However, the identity of the buyer was not revealed. It’s interesting to note that The Perfect Pink fetched almost 30 percent more than its upper estimate, revealing a high demand for colored diamonds in Asia.
Wittelsbach-Graff Diamond
The Wittelsbach-Graff Diamond is a gorgeous blue internally flawless diamond that weighs 31.06 carats. It is also from the Kollur Mine in India. Philip IV of Spain gifted it to his daughter upon her engagement to Emperor Leopold I of Austria.
In 1722, the diamond was acquired and named after the Wittelsbach family of Bavaria. In 2008, the jeweler Laurence Graff bought it for £16.4 million. Graff’s cutters removed flaws in the diamond and hence later on it went for $23.4 million at a Christie’s auction in 2010.
The De Beers campaign got it right, diamonds are indeed forever. Why else would we be sitting here gawking at the scintillating beauty of mere stones. If you want a timeless gem to write your own history, be sure to have a look at our eclectic collection of loose diamonds and designer diamond jewelry. You can also customize your own diamond jewelry on our website and in our store. Our collection of colored diamonds features both natural and lab-made diamonds.
