Diamond necklace linked to Marie Antoinette sells for $6.4 million

GENEVA — A diamond-studded necklace thought to be linked to a scandal that hastened the downfall of the doomed 18th century queen of France, Marie Antoinette, sold at auction in Geneva on Wednesday for 4.26 million Swiss francs (S$6.44 million).

Put up for sale by an Asian private collector, the Georgian-era piece containing 300 carats of diamonds fetched more than expected after a lengthy bidding battle, having been valued beforehand at up to 2 million francs, according to Sotheby's.

"It was an electric night," said Andres White Correal, a Sotheby's jewellery specialist, after the evening sale of the necklace to an undisclosed female buyer.

"There is obviously a niche in the market for historical jewels with fabulous provenances. People are not only buying the object, they are buying all the history that is attached to it."

Sotheby's said this month that some of the diamonds in the piece may have come from a necklace that helped precipitate the fall of Marie Antoinette, a member of the Austrian royal family who became the wife of French King Louis XVI.

Both were guillotined in 1793 during the French Revolution.

The jewels in question were at the centre of a 1785 scandal known as the Diamond Necklace Affair in which a hard-up noblewoman named Jeanne de la Motte pretended to be the French queen and acquired the necklace in her name without payment.

A subsequent trial found the queen blameless, but did little to diminish her growing notoriety for extravagance, which helped fuel the revolution and the overthrow of the French monarchy.

The diamonds of the original necklace, crafted in the 1770s, were later sold piecemeal on the black market and so are almost impossible to trace. However, some experts say the quality and age of the diamonds point to a match.

The necklace, which resembles a neck scarf, can be worn open or knotted at the front. One previous owner was Britain's Marquess of Anglesey, and a family member wore it on the occasion of Queen Elizabeth II's coronation, Sotheby's said.

White Correal said the buyer of the necklace was "ecstatic".

"She said something beautiful to me: 'I'm exceptionally happy that I won this lot; but I don't own it, I'm merely the custodian until the next person will come along'."