I t’s made of gold, silver and platinum, with a purple velvet cap and ermine band. It weighs 2.3lbs (1.06kg) and contains 2,868 diamonds in silver mounts. It holds a further treasury of coloured stones in gold mounts, including 17 sapphires, 11 emeralds, 269 pearls and 5 rubies. It sits under ceremonial armed guard in the Tower of London and has been seen by billions worldwide, taking pride of place at Coronations, State occasions and Royal funerals. It is immediately recognisable as the overarching statement of historical power, the embodiment of Britain’s heritage. It has even been featured dramatically in the opening credits of every episode of the Netflix series The Crown – as the titular symbol of the British monarchy. It is, of course, the Imperial State Crown.
The centrepiece of the world’s most famous set of Crown Jewels, the Imperial State Crown has been the ultimate icon of British sovereignty since the 15th century. Containing such priceless gems as St Edward’s Sapphire, set in the topmost cross (reputed to have been worn by St Edward the Confessor [1042-66] and discovered in his tomb in 1163) and the 104-carat Stuart Sapphire (traditionally thought to have been smuggled by James II when he fled England in December 1688), it is British history incarnate.
Ceremonially placed atop the head of a new monarch at the close of the Coronation ceremony (replacing the St Edwards Crown used during the ritual), it is only worn on significant State occasions until finally, it is placed on the monarch’s coffin – before being passed to the next in line of succession for a new cycle in one of the Kingdom’s most hallowed traditions.
In Sotheby’s Royal and Noble auction, 5-17 January, an extraordinary piece of history comes to market in the form of two fragments from the Imperial State Crown itself. In 1953, Harold Philip Goodship was foreman diamond mounter to the Goldsmiths and Silversmiths Company, Crown Jewellers, who were commissioned to prepare the Crown for Elizabeth II’s Coronation, on behalf of Garrard & Co Jewellers. The silver pieces that Goodship removed from the Crown during its resizing are now being offered for sale from this royal jeweller’s personal collection, for the very first time. The unique lot also contains ephemera, memorabilia, notes from a BBC Radio broadcast about the Crown’s preparation and a Coronation medal awarded to Goodship for his meticulous work.
‘To my knowledge this is the only time part of the Crown Jewels have ever come up for at auction.’
‘To my knowledge,’ says Kristian Spofforth, Sotheby’s Head of UK Jewellery, ‘this is the only time part of the Crown Jewels have ever come up for at auction. The British crown jewels are probably the most significant and most important crown jewels in the world – and have been for the last thousand years.’
The Imperial State Crown in its modern form was created for Queen Victoria’s Coronation in 1838 by then-Crown Jewellers Rundell, Bridge & Rundell. Over the course of 99 years, its fixtures and structure grew perilously wobbly, necessitating a new model being created for King George VI’s Coronation in May 1937 by Garrard & Co, who had assumed the role of Crown Jewellers. After King George VI’s death in 1952, the Crown was placed on his coffin during the funeral procession across London to Westminster Abbey – it was the first time television cameras had filmed such an event, beaming images of the Imperial State Crown on the coffin across the nation.
In order to prepare the Crown for Elizabeth II’s 1953 Coronation, master jeweller Harold Goodship, with fellow artisan Peter Williment, took on the daunting task of resizing the Imperial State Crown’s circlet to fit the new queen, narrowing the inner headband and lowering its arches by an inch (2.5 cm).
Speaking to a BBC radio programme ahead of the procedure (the transcript of which is included in this lot), Goodship explained what he would be doing. ‘The reason for remodelling now is purely that the Crown should fit Her Majesty,’ he says. ‘There’s a jewelled band where it fits over the brow of the Sovereign. Mounted on it are four fleur-de-lis and four Maltese crosses, and on top of these crosses spring four jewelled arches of pearls and diamonds, fashioned as oak leaves and acorns, a design dating back to the days of Charles II.’
A pair of George III silver-gilt ice dishes and covers, Paul Storr for Rundell, Bridge & Rundell, London (1812)
These dishes were made for Hugh Percy, 3rd Duke of Northumberland, and were most likely intended for ice cream – not only was this a luxurious treat during the Regency, but the silver is coated with a gilt layer for a sumptuously golden lustre.
An Anglo-Flemish cream-painted marble-topped side table, predominantly 17th century and later
This is an enigmatic table of a distinctive form incorporating sculptural caryatid supports. It is said to be from Stoke Park, the country residence of Charles I’s ambassador to France, Sir Francis Crane. Charles I and his French wife, Henrietta Maria, were even hosted for entertainments at Stoke Park; the main block of the house was heavily damaged by fire in the 1880s and was demolished around 1954, but the seventeenth-century pavilions still remain on the park grounds.
‘King Ahab preparing for battle’, A Flemish Old Testament Biblical Tapestry, from the series ‘The Life of Ahab and the Kings of Israel’, Brussels (circa 1550, workshop of Cornelis de Ronde)
During the Renaissance, tapestries were far more valuable than paintings; large-scale examples were also often acquired for noble residences in a large group, forming a splendid narrative cycle. Lot 44 of our sale, which is an astounding three and a half metres tall and four and a half metres wide, is part of a significant tapestry series made in the seventeenth century for Catherine of Austria, Queen of Portugal. It depicts the Biblical king Ahab about to go into battle.
An amethyst and diamond pendant (mid 19th century)
Queen Victoria had eight children, the youngest of whom went on to edit her mother’s journals: Princess Beatrice, born 1857, faithfully served her mother the Queen as secretary throughout her life, and was only permitted to marry Prince Henry of Battenberg in 1885 on the condition that she continue to do so. The amethyst pendant offered as lot 138 of this sale belonged to Princess Beatrice, and its cross form alludes to the Christian piety so central to Victoria’s principles for the modern royal family.
A Restauration giltwood fauteuil from the Palais de Tuileries (circa 1815) by Jacob-Desmalter
Napoleon’s new political approach was matched by a confident new aesthetic in the arts, patronising the best artists and furniture makers for his newly-decorated palaces. Lots 65 and 66 of the current sale are a set of armchairs (fauteuils) made for the Tuileries Palace for the apartments of Bonne Marie Félicité, Duchesse de Sérent, who was the dame d’honneur of King Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette’s daughter from 1799 until 1823. The chair is a classic model of the Napoleonic period and can be seen in several variations on numerous portraits of Napoleon’s courtiers.
A Regency gilt-bronze-mounted, brass-inlaid, rosewood and ebony centre table (circa 1815) attributed to George Bullock
After Napoleon was defeated in the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, he was exiled the island of St Helena by the British government, who were also responsible for supporting him and furnishing his residence there. Lot 26 of our sale is a table from this well-documented furniture suite, which was commissioned from a leading cabinet-maker of the day, George Bullock – plans of Longwood House from Bullock’s workshop are in the British Library and include drawings of tables that match the offered table. After Napoleon’s death, the tables were kept for several decades by his jailer, Sir General Hudson Lowe, at his house in London.
An oak, burr walnut and parcel-gilt hanging cabinet (circa 1841) probably designed by William Beckford and Henry Edmund Goodridge, attributed to English & Son
William Beckford (1760-1844) was the eclectic and brilliant collector behind Fonthill Abbey and a key figure in popularising the Gothic Revival. At the end of his life, he designed and created Lansdown Tower in Bath, an original combination of medieval, Ancient Greek, Ancient Roman and Byzantine architectural styles which now also houses his sarcophagus. He designed all of the interiors as well, which included this hanging cabinet in the ‘Crimson Drawing Room’.
A Russian gilt-bronze-mounted malachite armchair, (19th century), by the Demidoff Lapidary Factory
The Demidoff family owned the malachite mines in the Urals that were discovered in the early 19th century and led to a craze for decorative art objects veneered in its gorgeously-patterned green surface. Whole pieces of furniture veneered in this way are exceedingly rare: the chair offered as lot 77 is almost certainly part of the group of malachite furniture that was shown at the Demidoff stand at the 1851 Great Exhibition in London. The few other examples of malachite chairs were given as gifts by Prince Anatole Demidoff to the Grand Duke of Lorraine and the Queen of Spain and are now in museums.
Goodship went on to explain how the ‘intricate and highly skilled operation’ would involve removing the jewelled arches and crosses before removing all the jewels – ‘diamonds and pearls, rubies, sapphires and emeralds, hundreds of them’. He would end up cutting the headband into four pieces with a small jewellers’ fretsaw, delicately altering the shape of the headband by about an inch, before soldering the four pieces back together and painstakingly resetting the jewels.
As a result of this intricate, delicate surgery, two silver pieces were removed from the Crown and were later gifted to Goodship in recognition of his work, along with a Coronation medal (also included in the lot).
‘It’s the chance to own something that is the divine right of kings. It’s the chance to own something that is a big part of Britain.’
‘It’s the chance to own something that is the divine right of kings’, reflects Hope Francis, Associate Cataloguer for Jewellery at Sotheby’s. ‘It’s the symbol that God has given them this power it’s a change in role for these pieces. It’s the chance to own something that is a big part of Britain’.
Harold Goodship himself signed off his radio broadcast with characteristically humbled words. ‘More than once I’ve been asked what it’s like to hold this wonderful emblem in one’s hands. Well, it’s hard to give an adequate comparison with any other event – it is always a great moment of pride to feel one is holding what is after all, the emblem that binds together the British Commonwealth and Empire’.
Royal memorabilia from the Imperial State Crown is on view in our New Bond Street galleries, 15-17 January 2024
Banner image: The coffin of Queen Elizabeth II with the Imperial State Crown resting on top is carried by the Bearer Party as it departs Westminster Abbey during the State Funeral of Queen Elizabeth II on September 19, 2022 in London, England. (Photo by Joe Maher/Getty Images)