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The Orloff diamond (sometimes spelled Orlov)
was said to be a 300 carats rough stone discovered in South India. The
precise date of the discovery is unknown, the circumstances are related in
such a confused way, that it has hitherto been impossible to fix its first
definite appearance but the diamond has been involved for centuries in
historical events and even legends.
According to
the legend, the Orloff Diamond, was set in the eye
of the Hindu god Sri-Ranga in a temple in Srirangem, in southern India.
According to Dutens' account, a French grenadier, having deserted the Indian
service, found employment in the neighbourhood of the temple, where he soon
learnt from native report that the sacred edifice contained a celebrated idol
of the Hindu god Sri-Ranga, whose eyes were formed
by two large diamonds of inestimable value. The temple, situated on an island
in the Cauvery River, was surrounded by seven enclosures; no Christians were
ever permitted farther than the fourth. Once having pilfered the stone from
its sacred home around 1750, perhaps after untold years of patient planning,
the deserter fled to Madras where he would find protection with the English
army, as well as a buyer and sold the stone to a sea captain for
£2,000.
The captain, in
turn, is said to have sold it in London for £12,000 to a Persian
merchant named Khojeh Raphael, who took it to
Amsterdam. The as yet unnamed stone passed from merchant to merchant in the
everlasting quest for profit…
This is where
in 1775 the Russian nobleman, Count Gregory Orlov (Grigorievich Orlov 1723-83),
who was at the time residing at Amsterdam, heard rumours about the stone and
finally bought it for 400 000 dutch florins (other
sources say 1400000 florins) and took it back to Russia. He offered the gem
to Empress Catherine, who he had been romantically involved with in an
attempt to regain her love and his place as her favorite.
The prince was
out of favour because of his poor handling of the Ottoman-Rusian
crisis. He offered her the diamond on St. Catherine's Day in 1776, instead of
the traditional bouquet of flowers. She accepted the diamond but refused to
reinstate Orloff to his former powerful position in
the Court. Nevertheless the stone has been called the Orloff
since then. However, Grigori couldn't get
Catherine's love. He married his cousin, but following her death in Lausanne
in 1782, he became mentally deranged and returned to Russia to die the
following year.
Catherine never
wore the diamond, but had it mounted in the top of the Imperial Scepter which was completed in 1784, where it remains to
this day, in the Kremlin Museum. The sceptre is a burnished shaft in
three sections set with eight rings of brilliant-cut diamonds, including some
of about 30 carats each and fifteen weighing about 14 carats each. The Orloff is set at the top, with its domed top facing
forward. Above it is a double-headed eagle with the Arms of Russia enameled on its breast.
There is a
legend concerning the diamond, dating from the time of Napoleon. As the
Emperor of France's forces were approaching Moscow during the campaign of
1812, the Orlov was secreted in the tomb of a
priest in the Kremlin. When Napoleon entered Moscow he gave orders that the
gem be sought. After he learned of its whereabouts, Napoleon in person, accompanied
by his bodyguards, proceeded to the Kremlin to secure the diamond. The tomb
was opened to reveal the great gem. One of the bodyguards stretched out a
hand to take the diamond, but before he had touched it the ghost of the
priest rose up and cursed the invaders. Napoleon and his bodyguards are then
supposed to have fled empty-handed from the Kremlin.
The Orloff is a rarity among historic diamonds, it is an
antique rose cut diamond (flat bottom, and faceted domed top), weighing
approximately 194 carats (other sources say 189.62 carats), about the size of
half an egg.
 
The clarity is
typical of the finest Indian diamonds and its pure color
possesses a slight bluish-green tint. The shape of the diamond has been
described as resembling half a pigeon's egg and its upper surface is marked
by concentrated rows of triangular facets, with corresponding four-sided
facets appearing on the lower surface. The total number of facets is roughly
180. On one side of the diamond there exists a slight indentation. It
measures approximately 32mm by 35mm by 31mm.
It has never
been weighed, though once during cleaning in the early 20th century it fell
out of its mounting. The jeweller performing the cleaning weighed it before
putting it back into its mounting. Unfortunately, he never wrote down the
weight.
Quite a few
sources perpetuate the belief that the Orloff is
but a part of the larger Great Mogul and therefore the same stone which
vanished after the pillaging of Delhi in 1739. Most historians now agree that
the two diamonds have completely different origins.
When a
comparison is made between Tavernier's drawing of the Great Mogul and the
photographs of the diamond in the Kremlin, it immediately becomes apparent
there are similarities. The first lies in the shape. It will be recalled that
the Orlov has been described as resembling half a
pigeon's egg and that Tavernier referred to the Great Mogul as presenting
'the form of an egg cut in half.' Throughout history there cannot have been
many diamonds of such an unusual form. Secondly, the pattern of facets of the
two stones is not dissimilar. Thirdly, the previously-mentioned slight
indentation that exists in the Orlov must
correspond to Tavernier's note to that effect that 'there is a slight crack
and a little flaw in it.' In addition, as will be shortly shown, the story of
the Great Mogul would appear to have no known ending and that of the Orlov has no clear beginning - further historical evidence
that they are probably one and the same diamond.
On the other hand, there is the discrepancy between the weights of the two
stones. After being cut by the Venetian, Borgio,
the Great Mogul's weight was reduced to around 280 carats, whereas the Orlov is estimated to be less than 200 carats. In this
connection two points must be made. First, it has been shown by others that
Tavernier may not always have recorded with accuracy the weights of the
various stones he examined; for example, it is almost certain that he erred
in the weight he gave for the Great Table Diamond. Secondly, it is not at all
unlikely that at some point in its complicated history a further attempt may
have been made to alter the state of the Orlov - to
improve upon the efforts of Hortensio Borgio, by grinding away a portion of the top of
Tavernier's diamond to resemble the shape of the Orlov
today.
Finally, the Soviet authority on gems, Academician Alexander E. Fersman, who examined all the former Crown Jewels from a gemological point of view, was in no doubt that the Orlov was the same diamond as the Great Mogul.
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