Thank you for posting.
It strikes me as odd that the Queen's jewels were not photographed before they were sent for safe keeping in Russia. Of course few could have predicted what would actually happen but what if there was ever a dispute over what was sent?
I like the turquoise parure she recieved as a wedding gift from the Duke of Edinburgh. It is simple but perfect when you consider Marie was just 17 when she was forced into marriage by her formidable mother.
In Hannah Pakula's biography of Queen Marie, there is reference to her inheriting her mother's very valuable pearls. However I have never seen a picture of her wearing her mother's fabulous pearl tiara.
Marie Alexandrovna of Russia had one of the finest collections. The world is crying out for a biography on Marie Alexandrovna, she is my all time favourite royal character, one of the most interesting and complex royal women in my view.
My theory is that Queen Marie had her mother's tiara redesigned.
Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna wearing her fabulous pearls.
In the early 1920s Queen Marie started wearing this tiara. Her mother died in 1920 so she had inherited her pearls and we know Queen Marie had to rebuild her collection after WW1, so she could have modernised her mother's tiara or of course bought an entirely new one.
This is just a theory and I have no evidence, beyond Pakula saying Queen Marie inherited her mother's pearls, Queen Marie wearing a modern 1920s style pearl tiara in the years after her mother's death and no photographic evidence to suggest that Marie Alexandrovna's tiara was sold or is still in existence.
Either way I love both tiaras, so it is a bit of a shame if one was scarified for the other!
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