[MR] Wikipedia: Three Brothers Jewel Mystery

[Garth Groff and Sally Sanford]

Noble Friends,

"Today's Featured Picture" on Wikipedia shows a small painting of a
fantastic jewelry piece known as "The Three Brothers". The painting depicts
a massive diamond, surrounded by a triangle of three huge red spinels
(rubies in the parlance of the day).

The Three Brothers was commissioned around 1380 by John the Fearless (Duke
of Burgundy after 1404). After John's assasination during a parlay in 1419,
the jewels passed to his son, Philip the Good, one of the richest men in
Europe. The setting was considered part of Burgundy's crown jewels, and The
Three Brothers was inherited in 1467 by the last Duke of Burgundy, Charles
the Bold.

Charles valued the setting above all his other treasures, and carried it
with him on campaign. When his army was routed at the Battle of Grandson in
1476, the jewels were among the treasures seized by the victorious Swiss.
It passed to the city of Basel, whose magistrates commissioned the
miniature painting shown on the Wikipedia page as an advertisement for its
eventual sale. The jewels then came into possession of the Fugger family of
financiers.

The jewels were offered to Henry VIII by the Fruggers, but did not come
into English ownership until the reign of his Son, Edward VI. The piece was
a favorite of Queen Elizabeth, and is seeb in two of her surviving
portraits. James I had the jewels reset into a cap badge.

King Charles I tried to sell the The Three Brothers to raise money during
the English Civil War. His queen, Henrietta Maria, took the Brothers and
other treasures to the continent in 1642, but was initially unable to
find a buyer. The last trace of the Brothers is in 1645, when she sold an
otherwise unnamed piece matching the Brothers' description to Dutch
jewelers in the Hague for a bargain basement price.

Today the Basel picture is all that remains of The Three Brothers.

You can read the whole story at
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Brothers_(jewel) .

Yours Aye,


Mungo Napier, Laird of Mallard Lodge 🦆
(Self-confessed Burgundy geek)