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Archduke Karl von Habsburg , the Head of the House of Habsburg, has revealed that the legendary Florentine Diamond and fifteen other historic Jewels of the House of Habsburg long thought sold, stolen or lost have been hidden for decades in a Bank Vault in Canada , since  Empress Zita found refuge there during the Second World War.


The collection includes a number of other items of jewelry, including a diamond-encrusted Order of the Golden Fleece, the house order of the Hapsburg family.
Karl Habsburg-Lothringen said he was most moved by the medal commemorating the order, founded in 1430 in Bruges, Belgium, by Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy.



Some of the pieces in the collection were crafted, added to, or modified by his own ancestors. He shows a photograph of a clock, set within a large, pear-shaped emerald with another emerald as a cover, polished to a wafer-thin finish. Maria Theresa gave it to the future French queen, her daughter Marie Antoinette, who would later meet her end under the guillotine.
There is a bodice bow made of rubies, emeralds, and diamonds in the Hungarian national colors, which once belonged to Sisi. And there is the fateful stone, that large yellow diamond of 137 carats.
The diamond and the 15 other items in the safe are genuine. Köchert has no doubt about this; he has documented it in two expert reports.