Manufacture
The court jeweller Ekart and Jeremia Pauzie made the Great Imperial Crown for the coronation of Catherine the Great in 1762. The beautiful crown reflects Pauzie's skilled workmanship. It is adorned with 4936 diamonds arranged in splendid patterns across the entire surface of the crown Bordering the edges of the "mitre" are a number of fine, large white pearls. The crown is also decorated with one of the seven historic stones of the Russian Diamond Collection: a large precious red spinel weighing 398.72 carats (79.744 g), which was brought to Russia by Nicholas Spafary, the Russian envoy to China from 1675 to 1678. It is believed to be the second largest spinel in the world.
In formally adopting the Western term Emperor for the ruler of Russia Peter the Great also adopted Western imperial symbols, including the form of the private crowns (Hauskrone) used by the Holy Roman Emperors, (of which the only surviving example is the Austrian imperial crown of Rudolf II Imperial Crown of Austria) in which a circlet with eight fleur-de-lis surrounds a mitre with a high arch extending from the front to the back fleur-de-lis. Already in Austria some baroque representations of this type of crown found on statues of the saints had already transformed the two halves of the mitre into two half-spheres and this is the type of imperial crown used in Russia. Peter’s widow and successor, Catherine I, was the first Russian ruler to wear this form of imperial crown. In the Great Imperial Crown which the court jewelers Jeremia Posier and J. F. Loubierin made for Catherine II in 1762 these hemispheres are in open metalwork resembling basketwork with the edges of both the hemispheres bordered with a row of 37 very fine, large, white pearls. They rest on a circlet of nineteen diamonds, all averaging over 5 carats (1.0 g) in weight, the largest being the large Indian pear-shaped stone of 12⅝ cts in front, set between two bands of diamonds above and below. Posier showed his creative genius by replacing the eight fleur-de-lis with four pairs of crossed palm branches, while the arch between them is made up of oaks leaves and acorns in small diamonds surrounding a number of large diamonds of various shapes and tints running from the front pair of crossed palms to the back pair of crossed palms, while the basketwork pattern of the two hemispheres are divided by two strips of similar oak leaves and acorns from the two side pairs of palm btanches stretching up to the rows of large pearls on their borders. At the center and apex of the central arch is a diamond rosette of twelve petals from which rises a large red spinel, weighing 398.72 carats (79.744 grams), one of the seven historic stones of the Russian Diamond Collection, which was brought to Russia by Nicholas Spafary, the Russian envoy to China from 1675 to 1678. It is believed to be the second largest spinel in the world. This spinel, in turn, is surmounted by a cross of five diamonds, representing the Christian faith of the Sovereign, the God-given power of the monarchy and the supremacy of the divine order over earthly power. Except for the two rows of large white pearls the entire surface of the crown is covered with 4936 diamonds and is quite heavy, weighing approximately nine pounds (by contrast, the Crown of Monomakh weighs only two pounds). It was unfinished in time for Catherine's coronation and the original colored stones (e.g., emeralds in the palm branches and laurel leaves) were replaced with diamonds for the coronation of Paul I in 1797) it was used at every subsequent coronation until that of Nicholas II in 1896 and was last in imperial period at the State Opening of the Duma in 1906.
There was also a Lesser Imperial Crown, very similar in style and workmanship to the Great Imperial Crown, only smaller, and entirely set with diamonds made for Empress Maria Feodorovna, the consort of Paul I, that was used for the coronation of the Tsarina. At the coronation of Nicholas II in 1896, the smaller crown was worn by Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna as was her right as a crowned Empress. A second identical lesser Imperial Crown was made for the young Empress Alexandra Feodorovna to wear. Dowager Empresses outranked reigning Empress Consorts at the Russian Court.
In 1900, the Workshop of Peter Carl Fabergé in St. Petersburg made a replica in miniature of the Imperial Regalia (the Great Imperial Crown, the Lesser Imperial Crown, the Imperial Orb and Sceptre), out of silver, gold, diamonds, sapphires, and rubies, the whole set on a marble pedestal. The work is now in the collection of the Hermitage Museum.
Read more about this topic: Imperial Crown Of Russia
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