Sapphires in Sweden

When Queen Silvia of Sweden is in full dress she often wears a large garniture in sapphires and diamonds. Again it is one of the Napoleonic parures that made its way to the Swedish Queen. Now the Leuchtenberg parure, as it is called, consists of a tiara in a vast diamond setting, earrings, a magnificient collier, a brooch and two hairpins. It is so characteristic of the Napoleon jewellery with its large stones very elegantly framed with diamonds.

Originally it belonged to the Duchess Amalie Augusta of Leuchtenberg who surely had it as a wedding present from Napoleon when she married his stepson, Eugène de Beauharnais, in 1805. Their eldest daughter, Princess Josefina of Leuchtenberg married the Crown Prince of Sweden, later King Oscar I, in 1823. Queen Josephine inherited tha parure from her mother in 1851.

In her own will Queen Josefina left the sapphires to her grandchild, later King Gustav V of Sweden, and his wife, Queen Victoria, born a princess of Baden, wore it already as a young crown princess. King Gustav V had the jewellery made part of the Bernadotte Family Foundation so that the sapphires could be worn by all Swedish first ladies. Queen Victoria, Queen Louise and Princess Sibylla often wore them, as does Queen Silvia.