Hello board members. Looking at a photo posted by Franck recently in relation to the County of Lincoln brooch, my attention was drawn to Queen Mary’s circlet.

Originally, at the time of QM’s coronation, the crown held the Koh-i-Nûr set in the front cross, with Cullinan IV set just below this in the base / band. Moving onto the coronation of her son, King George in 1937, and both of these stones had been removed from the circlet. Indeed, in the photo posted by Franck, you can clearly see the Koh-i-Nûr in the new queen’s crown (QEQM), while QM wore the Cullinan III & IV together in the brooch configuration. So, I started wondering what QM replaced these two stones with in her circlet?

Investigating, I was led to the Royal Collection site, which states that after QM’s coronation, she removed these large diamonds (along with Cullinan III from the very top) so that they could be worn separately, and replaced them with “quartz crystal replicas”.

While that may have been true following her 1911 coronation, I just struggle to believe that this remained the case of what QM ended up wearing to her son’s coronation. My reasons for this include:
- QM loved her diamonds, and I find it hard to believe she would have worn ‘paste’ stones to the most sacred of ceremonies.
- Knowing that she would be appearing all day besides QEQM, who was clearly wearing the Koh-i-Nûr and Cullinan IV front and centre in her own crown, the inferiority of a paste stone would just scream out to everyone (i.e. the paste stone replacing the Koh-i-Nûr in QM’s circlet).

Perhaps I am wrong, and the paste stones were indeed used. Wondering whether there are any really clear photos of QM at the 1937 coronation that show the shape / composition of the stones in the front of QM’s circlet.