Marie Antoinette pearl reaps record $36 million, with fees
GENEVA (AP) — A large, drop-shaped natural pearl pendant sold for more than $36 million on Wednesday at a rare auction of jewelry that once belonged to French Queen Marie Antoinette, which Sotheby’s is calling a record price for a pearl at auction.
The “Queen Marie Antoinette’s Pearl,” a diamondand-pearl pendant, was among the highlight offerings on the block at the Sotheby’s sale of jewelry from the Bourbon-Parma dynasty in Geneva.
Sotheby’s billed the sale as a once-in-a-lifetime chance to scoop up heirlooms and jewels that have been held in the Bourbon-Parma dynasty for generations. Some of the Marie Antoinette jewelry had not been seen in public for 200 years — until now.
Like many of the 10 former Marie Antoinette pieces up for sale, the pendant obliterated the pre-auction estimate – in its case, $1 million to $2 million. It sold for a hammer price of 32 million Swiss francs ($32 million), but with the buyer’s premium and fees, the total sale rose to more than $36.1 million.
The buyer wanted to remain anonymous, according to the auction house.
All told, the Marie Antoinette pieces reaped nearly $43 million.
The diamond-and-pearl jewelry of Marie Antoinette that went under the hammer epitomized the aloof, pre-Revolutionary opulence of French royals brought down by the uprising. The wife of King Louis XVI, she was executed in France’s revolutionary fervor in 1793.
“The Marie Antoinette pendant is simply irreplaceable,” Eddie LeVian, chief executive officer of jewelers Le Vian, said before the sale. “This is about far more than the gems themselves: Marie Antoinette’s jewelry is inextricably linked to the cause of the French Revolution.”