Video: The Mystery of Caligula's Ring: How Much Is a Sapphire Jewel Really Worth and Whose Profile It Shows
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
Crafted from a solid sapphire, this sky blue ring is shrouded in mystery. It is believed that it belonged to the famous Roman tyrant emperor Caligula, and it was with this formulation that the jewel was put up for sale in London for huge sums of money. However, the further fate of the ring is unknown to the general public, in addition, other versions of its origin and original belonging are being put forward. One hundred percent is not solved and another riddle: who was that stranger, whose profile is depicted on the ring?
Sapphire hololith (product from a single piece of precious stone) experts have estimated at 500,000 pounds sterling. This price was announced to potential buyers at the Multum in parvo engraved gem collection exhibition in London a few months ago. The exposition was presented by the famous antique jewelry company Wartski.
Experts believe that this ring, made of stone and gold, is at least two thousand years old. Representatives of Wartski, who are also jewelers of the British Queen and Prince Charles, assure that this ring was once owned by the Roman emperor Caligula and it was one of the so-called Marlboro gems.
The female profile, with an amazing skill for ancient times, engraved on the stone, according to experts Wartski, belongs to the last wife of Caligula. Beauty Caesonia, according to historians, was so good-looking that the emperor, far from moral principles, even paraded her naked in front of his army and friends.
It is also known that Caesonia was killed shortly after the death of her husband, without resistance, offering her neck to the killer and even asking him to do it as quickly as possible.
The exhibit, which included more than a hundred engraved gems, sold for between £ 5,000 and £ 500,000, with the so-called Caligula Ring asking for the highest of these amounts.
The exposition aroused great interest all over the world, and the news about the sapphire rarity put up for sale spread through many news agencies. However, the public was not informed about who bought this ring and, in general, whether such a rich man was found. At least, this hololith could not be found on the website of the Wartski family antique jewelry company.
Some experts believe that the ring was sold, but the buyer's name might not have been disclosed due to the confidentiality agreement. Skeptics say that the piece of jewelry might not have been as ancient as stated, and the story of its incredible origin is just a beautiful legend invented by the organizers to attract the attention of buyers to the exhibition.
In particular, among experts, an alternative version is being put forward about whose portrait is depicted on a sapphire ring. Her supporters believe that the profile may have belonged to the Roman empress Faustina. And in this case, the hololith can no longer be attributed to the jewels of Caligula, because this emperor lived much earlier than both the older and younger Faustina (recall that this name was borne by both the wife of the emperor Marcus Aurelius and her mother, wife of Antonina Pius).
But it turned out to be easy to trace the geography of the movement of the jewelry over the past few centuries. From 1637 to 1762, Caligula's ring was kept by the Earl of Arundel, after which it became part of the famous collection "Marlborough Stones", which consisted of eight hundred jewels collected at the turn of the 18th-19th centuries by George Spencer, a politician and fourth Earl of Marlborough. In 1875, John Winston Spencer-Churchill, 7th Duke of Marlborough, sold the jewelry to raise money to repair the ancestral castle, and the collection came to David Bromilow from Bittswell Hall (he bought it for 35,000 pounds sterling, which is roughly equal to 2, 2 million modern pounds sterling).
David's daughter in 1899 sold Caligula's ring at Christie's in London to dealer Julius Goldschmidt. After a long lull, the jewel resurfaced only in 1971 at Sotheby's in London, where it was bought for only £ 750. Then the ring got into a private collection in France, from where it was bought by representatives of Wartski.
“The exact price of the jewel will not be disclosed,” announced Wartski director Kieran McCarthy.
It is hoped that the further history of the sapphire ring will soon become clear.
Continuing the topic: truth and fiction about Emperor Caligula
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