Episode Transcript
Good day, my darling hobgoblins, we meet once again. As you might have noticed, Ms. Dana has been stepping in for me on an increasing basis and so we decided to make her just a regular old johnny around here. An official Mortician’s Daughter podcaster, if not actually a mortician’s daughter, but she does work in deathcare and she caught a ride off a funeral convention floor in a vintage hearst. She’s part of the family now.
Well, back in Episode 25, Dana talked about some cursed tombs, but when I started writing that episode I actually wanted to dive into cursed objects… I just got distracted by a tomb tangent and the rest, as they say, is history.
Cursed objects is a subject I consider close to my heart. I can’t say where this fascination originated, but it shines brightest when the subject of the Hope Diamond, or the French Blue, comes up. Which you might be surprised to discover is actually not all that often.
But we’ll get to that in just a moment…
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First, let’s talk about what might curse an object. A tragic origin, certainly. Or an owner’s tragic end, obviously. Possession by demon or malicious spirit. Sure, sure, sure. Ghosts sucked into an object they cherished. Magical curses meant to protect a grave or punish an enemy. And sometimes it’s just some wiley ectoplasmic energy echoing in this world. Am I missing anything?
The history of the Hope Diamond begins in Golconda, India where a "beautiful violet" diamond was unearthed in the Kollur mine and then sold to a French merchant named Jean Baptiste Tavernier.
The merchant then sold the diamond to King Louis XIV of France in 1668.
The raw Golconda diamond is cut and named the French Blue. It was then stolen in 1792 and cut again. The diamond disappears from history after thefts or beheadings, but it shows up again in history in 1839 when it appeared in the gem catalogue of the Hope banking family, made wealthy through Hope & Co, a Dutch bank that operated from London than Amsterdam for two and half centuries until 1795.
The Hope Diamond, as it is now called, lands in the hands of socialite Evalyn Walsh McLean and then was sold by her estate to Harry Winston, an American Jeweler. Winston sent the diamond on tour for a while and then donated it to the Smithsonian Institute in 1958 where it remains on exhibit.
So that’s the basic rundown of its history, but if we take a closer look, we find some curious events that have led a number of people to believe the Hope Diamond carries a curse that brings misfortune to those who possess it.
Okay, let's start with the purported origin of this gem, The Golconda Diamond, pulled straight out of Kollur mine, or so the story goes. But there’s another story. One that claims the violet blue diamond was actually stolen from a sculpture of the Hindu goddess Sita. Yeah, the stolen eye of Sita.
In this version, Tavernier did not buy the diamond, but stole it - from a temple. Yes, he stole a single eye from a matching set. And then the temple priests cursed whoever might possess the stolen eye of Sita.
Now, that story might be a fanciful creation of those spooky Victorians, when books like Frankenstein, Dracula, and Jane Eyre were all the rage. Ancient Egyptian curses, seances, and Edgar Allan Poe. Few eras roll so hard on the macabre like the Victorian Era.
The story of the stolen eye of a goddess continued and even historians haven’t been able to turn up this Sita statue with a missing eye. Some stories claim the French merchant's body met a violent end… being torn apart by wolves, but once again, historical evidence points to dying of natural causes at the age of 84. Hardly a tragic end beyond all loss being tragic, you know what I mean?
Nevertheless, there have been too many stories about misfortune, violent &/or untimely deaths, and just all around awfulness to dismiss the rumors entirely without further discussion. According to an article published in the New York Times back in 1911, there's a whole history of horrible fates connected to the Hope Diamond, including two suicides, several murders, multiple death-by-mob, poverty, misery, prison, and, lest we forget, that merchant who was torn apart by wild dogs.
Just thinking about the number of owners killed by mobs of violent people is wild.
I mean, there’s Prince Ivan Kanitovski of Russia, one time owner of the diamond, who was beheaded with his son by revolutionaries. There are several French nobles also murdered by mobs. And, a man named Kulub Bey, a guardian of the stone, was hanged by a mob in Turkey.
King Louis XIV who first owned the French Blue allowed his mistress, Madame de Montespan, to don the jewel on occasion. She had seven children with the king, six of whom were legitimized, but that didn't save her from the scandal of the Affair of the Poisons.
The Affair of the Poisons was a sudden trend of poisoners that turned into a mini inquisition where fortune tellers, alchemists, and local dealers of love potions and healing poultices faced scandal and death. And, of course, midwives and healers were popular figures to burn at the stake.
The king's own mistress, Madame de Montespan, was implicated in the Affair. She was questioned while under the influence of some heavy drinking and supposedly admitted to buying aphrodisiacs and performing black masses to maintain her hold on the king's heart. Cast out of favor, she retired to a country estate and spent the rest of her life in penance.
The one thing I gotta say about the Affair of the Poisons right now is that arsenic powder was also called Inheritance Powder in France at the time. Maybe this was more about securing a speedy transfer of family wealth and power and less about black masses and ritual killings.
All said and done, 442 people were implicated, 367 arrest orders were issued, 36 people were executed, 23 exiled, and 5 were sent to the galleys. The number of those killed during the Affair does not include the people who died from torture during questioning or suicide while in custody.
So maybe Madame de Montespan got off easy - exiled from court rather than beheading or burning at the stake like so many others.
Her lover, King Louis XIV, died from gangrene and the French Blue passed to Louis XVI who gifted it to his wife, Marie Antoinette. The couple was guillotined during the French Revolution. Well, one of the French Revolutions. There were three major revolutions in France in less than a century. The one in 1789, then 1830, and then 1848.
So then a friend of Marie Antoinette, Princess Marie-Louise de Lamballe, who was also killed by a violent mob. She was known to wear the jewel on occasion. The exact details of her death at the hands of the crowd are also varied. Some stories say she was beaten and stabbed by the crowd and others have suggested everything from rape to bodily mutilations. Once again, the story might have been exaggerated for propaganda purposes. Or not. Don’t know. Can’t Say.
During the revolution, the diamond was stolen - surprise! It turns up next in the hands of Wilhelm Fals, a Dutch jeweler who cut the 115-carat diamond to the 45 carat diamond we now know as the Hope Diamond. Wilhem was later murdered by his son Hendrik who stole the diamond and later killed himself.
This is where the Diamond goes into hiding. Hendrik stole it and died without mentioning where he might have sold it, or buried it, or thrown it from a bridge. It was probably that first one because the next time the blue diamond makes an appearance it’s in the gem catalog of the Hope family.
Henry Philip Hope faced a run of bad luck and lost his only son. The jewel then passed to Lord Francis Hope who's sudden twist of fate brought a public scandal, an unhappy marriage, and eventual ruin. Lord Hope's wife, who wore the diamond, also died in poverty.
The stone makes its way to New York where it finds Jacques Colot who went mad then it passed to Prince Ivan. You remember? Murdered by revolutionaries. But I would be remiss if I didn't mention Ivan's mistress, Lorens Ladue, who wore the jewel. She was murdered by her lover. Yes, the Prince. Ivan. But his was coming.
The diamond then found itself in the collection of French jeweler Pierre Cartier who sold it to Evalyn Walsh McLean. She was photographed wearing the Hope diamond and it was rumored that she even attached the jewel to her dog's collar. I gotta say, my dog Eleanor is pretty fancy, but I don't know if I'd let her run about wearing a priceless diamond, even if blue is her color.
Of course, the bad luck followed. Evalyn lost her mother-in-law and then her 9-year-old son. Her husband left her for another woman, her daughter died of a drug overdose, and Evalyn died awash in debt. Her surviving children sold the diamond to Harry Winston, an American jeweler known as the King of Diamonds.
Winston got his start as a jeweler when he found a 2 carat emerald at a pawn shop and bought it for 25 cents. He resold that same jewel for $800 a couple of days later and his profession was locked in. Sounds like a lucky guy, right? Find an emerald for a quarter and build an empire?
Sadly, at the passing of Harry Winston, his two sons started battling for control of the company. For decades. Dear old dad died in 1978, but the matter wasn’t resolved until one brother bought out the other brother in 2000. Fun fact, the company was then sold to the Swatch Watch company in 2013. Swatch doesn’t really have anything to do with the Hope DIamond, but I really loved my swatch watch and I also enjoy saying “swatch watch.”
So back 1958 Mr. Harry Winston decided to donate the Hope Diamond to the Smithsonian. Just stuck it in an envelope and sent it through the US mail. Postage cost $2.44.
Now, the Smithsonian Institution is a group of museums created by the U.S. government to foster knowledge. The gemstone remains there today and is now valued at a quarter of a billion dollars. It's the most visited exhibition at the Smithsonian.
That doesn't sound like bad luck to me, but there are those who would argue that the country’s been experiencing a steady decline since the middle of the 20th Century and it’s because the American people now own the Hope Diamond.
I don’t know if I believe all the hype about the diamond, but I’m willing to try anything. Maybe we should stick it in an envelope, pay the postage, and deliver it to someone else. Someone who sucks. I’m not naming names. Not today.
I guess what it comes down to is if an opportunity to wear, to steal, to purchase, transport, or own the Hope Diamond comes your way, I’d suggest a hard pass. Sure, it’s worth a quarter of a billion, but is a quarter of a billion worth the risk?
Yes. Probably Yes.
Whatever. Don’t commit crimes. That’s my official position on the matter while I’m on the record.
We only had time to discuss one cursed object, but it’s my favorite. There are several more I’d love to talk about but we’ll have to wait for another installment.
Until next time, my dears, I hope you are enjoying longer nights and uncursed jewels.
