The Royal Jewels EP 2 Full Documentary.

The English Queen Elizabeth II is frequently seen wearing a magnificent tiara that once belonged to the Russian Grand Duchess Vladimir, one of the most unique characters in the Russian imperial family. The Vladimir tiara is one of the few pieces of jewelry that survived the Russian Revolution, all thanks to the heroic deeds of one brave man. This is the story of the incredible number of unique jewels once owned by the Imperial House of Russia, whose power and riches have never been equaled. It's a symbol and it's a way to show your power, your strength, your prestige. These impressive jewels tell the story of a family's unlimited power and their dramatic fall following the execution of the last Tsar. As they had got rid of the family, there was no point in keeping the jewels and they needed the money anyway. The story begins with a coronation of Nicholas II. The last Emperor of Russia is crowned in 1896. For the coronation ceremony, Nicholas II is wearing all the symbols of imperial power, which for generations have represented the unfathomable power and riches of a single family. The imperial crown is a masterpiece of contemporary lapidary art, first worn by Catherine the Great in 1762 and now for one last time by Nicholas II. Next to Nicholas II is his wife Alexandra, now the new Tsarina. For this special occasion, a new Empress's crown has been made, since her mother-in-law, Danish-born dowager Empress Dalmar, is still First Lady of the Imperial Realm. The Empress's wore all the large pieces of jewelry and the glitter because it was a status symbol and the people liked to see the Romanov's kitted out in all their jewels. All the members of the Russian imperial family are present at the coronation and all the Grand Duchesses are wearing their finest jewelry for the occasion. As a memento, 18 Grand Duchesses have all been given a special coronation brooch by the Tsar. Most of these magnificent jewels have disappeared today, but in the Danish Royal House a single coronation brooch, inherited from Grand Duchess Anastasia, still exists. Next to Anastasia is Nicholas II's aunt, the Grand Duchess Vladimir. Just one of her tiaras are still in existence today. It is worn by the English Queen Elizabeth. The magnificence of the imperial court surpasses everything and the wealth of the imperial family is enormous. The palaces were absolutely enormous. It's very hard in this day and age to imagine what they were like. I do know that my father always referred to Buckingham Palace as a cottage, compared to the palaces of Russia, particularly the Winter Palace, that was vast and he used to play games up and down the corridors with the Tsar's girls and with his brothers he would have cycle races and roller skating competitions up and down because they were so enormous and so wide it was like going up and down one of our country lanes. Everything at the exalted Russian court is done in French. Russia was one of the countries where the French influence was the greatest. Everything in Russia was influenced by the fashion of Paris, by the habits of Paris. We spoke French at the court, the service of the dishes was done in French and not in Russian and up to the clothes, we got dressed in Paris, but we also sent our laundry to be cleaned in Paris. Through the generations the Russian Imperial House has acquired the largest jewels of the most impeccable quality. The court is like the Arabian Nights with diamonds the size of walnuts, rubies and emeralds, red as blood and green like life itself, sapphires the size of dove eggs and pearls like giant raindrops mounted in perfectly balanced rows of platinum, gold and glittering brilliance. Everything sparkles like the water of a fountain filled with all the colors of the rainbow. My grandmother always talked about the amazing glitter of the jewels of the women at the ball and the room itself with its amazing chandeliers and everything and the candles. It was a totally unforgettable experience. The court jeweler Fabergé is renowned for making one artistic masterpiece after the other for the Russian Imperial family. Fabergé, who's the most famous jeweler of the Imperial Russia, practically did not design jewelry. He designed objects, every kind. The Russian had to translate everything into gold and precious stone, so there was Fabergé to translate your writing instrument, your bell, your whatever, into a precious object. Every year the Fabergé workshop delivers magnificent and unique Easter eggs that the Tsar gives to his nearest and dearest. This egg, with hand-painted pictures of Danish castles, was made for his Danish mother. These Imperial eggs by Fabergé all had a surprise or a secret. You would push a little diamond and then something will spring out of the egg. There is also one egg which has the reproduction of the Trans-Siberian train, this size in platinum. There's one with the Imperial yacht or the reproduction of the Imperial carriage. All that was the charm of it. It was called the surprise that the Emperor would give to his wife or to his mother. In 1903, Nicholas II and Alexandra arrange a magnificent ball in the Winter Palace, and all the guests are supposed to arrive dressed in suitable costumes from the 17th century. Costume balls in royal courts is a very old tradition. The difference with our costume balls, when we go to costume balls, we go or we hire a costume or whatever, and we cover ourselves in fake jewellery. There, the jewels were real and they had the costumes, the brocade costumes, inlet with real precious stone. The hosts have gone to great lengths with their costumes and even order special jewellery at Fabergé. The hat of the Emperor Nicholas II, which reproduced exactly the hat of a 17th century Tsar, is inlaid with real stone. And the Empress asked Fabergé to make a necklace with the most enormous stone that there was. And there is an emerald which is exactly this size hanging there on the picture. The Tsar's aunt, Grand Duchess Vladimir, is wearing a magnificent costume. For this special occasion, she has fastened a chain of large and rare emeralds on her headdress. She was given this unique chain as a wedding present from her father-in-law, Tsar Alexander II. My great-grandmother had a great propensity for jewels. She was a lady who loved pretty things and they came to her and she had the means to buy them. And she was a terrific spender and her rooms in St. Petersburg, apparently in the Vladimir Palace, were full of jewels. She had a cabinet in each corner of her room according to the colour of the jewels. So she had a white cabinet, which was diamond, and a green one, and a blue one, and a red one. And her collection was extraordinary. People came to see her, they would be taken there and she had great delight in showing all these jewels off. Grand Duchess Vladimir comes originally from the Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin in northern Germany. In 1874, she marries the second son of the Russian Tsar, Grand Duke Vladimir, having first abandoned her German fiancé, Duke Georg von Schwarzburg-Rudelstadt. Georg Schwarzburg was a much older man who came from a rather unexciting German family. And I'm not sure how exciting he himself was, poor thing. Anyhow, so when Grand Duke Vladimir came on the scene, she was very taken with him. And for a young ambitious woman, he was clearly a far more interesting proposition as a lifetime partner. And it was a very successful marriage. For her engagement with the Tsar's son, Grand Duchess Vladimir is wearing a tiara with a 137 carat sapphire. This magnificent blue gemstone, the size of a pigeon's egg, is recycled 35 years later by the jeweler Cartier, who makes a new tiara inspired by the Russian kokoshnik style. An extra feature is the fact that the sapphires can be removed from the tiara and used as individual brooches. The kokoshnik is an old Russian tradition of a hair ornament that women and young ladies wear. It's a kind of tiara, but in silk or in velvet. The richer you are, the more jewels you add to this pattern. And in the end, you design tiaras which looked like the kokoshnik. The imperial family had many. Grand Duchess Vladimir, of course, had dozens of kokoshnik, all in layers with sapphires, emeralds, rubies, diamonds, pearls, whatever you want. The finest jewelers are found in Paris. At Chaumet and Cartier, the members of the imperial family order fashionable sets of jewelry designed to underline the imperial splendor. They would order the jewels at Cartier or Chaumet. Very often, the Russian, like Grand Duchess Vladimir, would not buy a ready-made piece of jewelry. She would bring her own precious stone from the Russian treasure and ask Cartier or Chaumet, could you mount it? So he would mount or make a lot of design. Or she would come and say, I would like this kind of design. It was a unique piece designed for her. For her silver anniversary in 1899, the Grand Duchess is given a very modern piece of jewelry, the waterfall tiara, made by the jeweler Chaumet in Paris. The court jeweler Bolin runs a large shop covering several stories in St. Petersburg next to the Winter Palace. For more than 100 years, Bolin has supplied the Russian imperial family with the most magnificent jewels. Among other things, the company has made a tiara with the finest pearls, set in diamonds, ordered by Tsar Alexander I. The tiara is part of the Russian crown jewels, but the Tsar's mother, the Dowager Empress Daumar, is so fond of this particular piece of jewelry, she keeps it at home. The Tsar's wife Alexandra also prefers to wear the Bolin masterpieces. The last empress, she was very coquette in a way. She had a great sense of fashion. She dressed beautifully. And also, she liked jewelry. And either she designed it, either she had them designed under her instruction. And she had two favorite tiaras. One was enormous in diamonds and pearls, with which she's photographed. I think this tiara disappeared in the revolution. This particular tiara is also made by Bolin. And another one, fabulous, with in the middle a pink diamond, which as you know, is a great rarity. This tiara is not made by Bolin, but is used with a wedding crown created by Bolin. It is a tradition in the Russian imperial family that all the Grand Duchesses wear this set for their wedding. In 1902, it is time for Grand Duchess Vladimir's daughter, Helena, to wear the characteristic bridal set. Bolin has probably also created Grand Duchess Vladimir's favorite tiara, the circle tiara, with the large drop pearls. Fearing an assassination attempt, Nicholas II and the Tsarina have moved outside of Saint Petersburg. The people are starving, and the gap between the ordinary poor Russians and the overwhelmingly wealthy imperial family is enormous. The big drama is that the imperial family are totally cut from the Russian reality. They are totally unknown by the people. No one knows them. They are stuck in their palaces. The last emperors, they had the best intentions. They were nice people. They were good people. They weren't cruel, but they had no idea of that reality. With the Tsar and Tsarina out of town, Grand Duchess Vladimir is the absolute ruler of society circles, and her magnificent salons are the venue for the cultural and social life of the upper class. This is definitely not to the Tsarina's liking. Empress Alexander was jealous of that, and so they hated each other deadly, and there were endless intrigues by Grand Duchess Vladimir against the Empress. So that went from the beginning wrong, and Grand Duchess Vladimir's intrigue went a bit far in the sense that it was not only society gossip or nasty comments. I think at a certain point she wanted to have the Emperor and Empress removed and her son to become the Emperor. Grand Duchess Vladimir also has her own opinion of how her nephew Tsar Nicholas II is supposed to rule the enormous country. She frightened everyone. I mean she was a terror. Everyone was terribly frightened by her in the family. She knew what she wanted, and she imposed her will to everyone. My great-grandmother was always on the move, and she knew everybody and was very much in touch with everybody. And she liked to feel, I think she was, at the center of all the big decisions that were made in Europe. So she had in that sense a grasp of everything that was going on. I'd probably say a lot of it too. Grand Duchess Vladimir lives in close proximity to the powers. She takes part in all official events, in this case easily recognizable in her dark dress following just behind the Tsar and Tsarina. In Russia, the Yusupov family is by far the richest, surpassing even the imperial family with their enormous possessions. The Romanovs were very rich, but my father always told me that the Yusupovs were far, far richer in land and money. I believe that Felix Yusupov had 40 estates in Russia to choose from, plus a good few palaces. The Yusupov's private collection of jewelry and art is second to none, and there is only one heir, the son Felix. The Yusupov family's wealth was legendary, and Felix himself was also a bit of a legend in his lifetime. And since Felix went to Oxford in his youth, and he was very, very beautiful, but he had relationships. These days you would call him bisexual. In those days there wasn't such a thing. He had relationships with both men and women at Oxford, smoked opium and drank a lot. I suppose that was rather 21st century, but long before its time. Felix is thoroughly testing the limits of good behavior. He performs secretly as a female singer in a nightclub, and he goes to the opera dressed in his mother's dresses and jewelry. On one occasion, it almost ends in disaster. It is extremely important that the wealthy Felix marries sensibly, and Dalma's granddaughter Irina, who is also the niece of Nicholas II, is a suitable match. They wanted him to marry well and produce an heir, and he did, and he did. My grandfather, Grand Duke Alexander, wasn't overly keen because he'd heard so many rumors about the lifestyle of Felix. Felix did actually tell my aunt Irina, who was always known as Titi in the family, everything. He didn't hold anything back, and she accepted it. So anyhow, they married, and I believe they were incredibly happy. Felix and Irina marry in 1914. At the wedding, Irina is wearing a very modern tiara, a gift from Felix's mother. Cartier has made the tiara from pressed crystal, and at the French jeweler Chaumet, another exquisite gift awaits the young bride. Felix Yusupov and my aunt Irina went to Paris for their honeymoon in 1914, and there he presented my aunt as a wedding present a famous tiara called the sunburst tiara. Really, really pretty, and it glittered, and it was fantastic. And when he presented it to her, he said that she didn't need any jewels to make her any more beautiful, which was just as well because later on after the revolution, she didn't have any jewels because she had to sell them for food. On the occasion of the wedding, French jeweler Chaumet exhibits the jewels the company has made for Irina. Later on, Felix makes a scrapbook of the jewels. Felix's jewel collection is unique, containing among others the famous La Pellegrina Pearl. With its extremely rare brilliance, it is the most exquisite pearl the world has ever seen. The pearl has been known since at least 1660, and it has been owned by both the Spanish and the French royal family. In 1826, it was bought by Felix's grandmother, Tatiana Yusupov, who wore it in her right ear. The art of seeding pearls wasn't developed until the beginning of the 1900s. This is why pearls before that time were extremely rare and just as valuable as diamonds. Felix and Irina travel a lot in Europe, and since they are not part of the inner circle of the imperial family, they can move freely in the early days of the revolution. He took a lot of artworks and jewels out of Russia before the revolution. He owned a house in Switzerland with a car. He owned an apartment in Paris. I think he owned one in London, not knowing that there was going to be a revolution, but he needed his lovely things around him. Only a few people know that the heir to the throne, the Tsar's son Alexei, is suffering from haemophilia. The mysterious monk Rasputin has moved in with the imperial family, who hopes he can save the boy. But Rasputin also seems to gain more and more influence over Nicholas II, and that worries a lot of people, including the usually carefree Felix Yusupov. Felix and Grand Duke Dmitry decided they would bump off Rasputin, who at the time was the Tsar and Tsarina's personal guru. The rest of Russia was very dubious about this guy, and Felix, I think, didn't like the power that he thought he had over the court. So he and the Grand Duke decided they would get rid of him, which eventually they did by poisoning and shooting three times, and then they killed him. Nicholas II is facing serious challenges. Strikes are spreading from the railroads to factories and public institutions. The people are freezing and starving to death. Grand Duchess Vladimir is not impressed with her nephew Nicholas II and his abilities to rule the country, and she is extremely concerned for the future of the imperial family in Russia. The situation in St. Petersburg is tense, and she decides to go to the spa town of Kislovodsk. She felt threatened, and she felt unsafe, and she felt vulnerable, so she went to the Caucasus. When everything was left where she had left it, because they all thought they were coming back in a few months when this thing blew over. This will, in fact, be the last time the Grand Duchess sees St. Petersburg. She has left all her jewels in a secret safe behind the wall of her boudoir in the Vladimir Palace. In 1917, the imperial regime finally falls. Nicholas II is forced to abdicate, and soon the Russian Revolution is surging forward, led by Trotsky and Lenin. In August, the imperial family is exiled to Siberia. They left with an entire train of luggage, and in the luggage there was a mass of jewels, mountains. So they arrive at the first stop of their exile, which was Tobolsk in Siberia. And their conditions were, they were prisoners, but they were quite normal, and they could receive clergy, priests, and nuns from the monasteries of the neighborhood. Everybody is keeping up their courage, believing it is only a matter of time before they are liberated. But Nicholas II still decides to hide a large part of their jewels. They put it in boxes, and they ask the priests and the nuns to hide them in the monasteries of the neighborhood. Eight months later, the family is sent to Ekaterinburg, where they are incarcerated in the Ipatiev House, codenamed the House of Special Purposes. When they arrived there, they understood that the conditions were not at all the same. To hide their jewels and gemstones, the women of the family sew them into their corsets. Late one night, the family is woken and taken to the cellar. Here Nicholas II and his wife and their five children are executed. When Nicholas II and his family were being murdered in the cellar by firing squad, the bullets ricocheted off the bodices of the girls, and the guards couldn't understand why this was happening, which of course stunned them, but didn't kill them, so they had to actually stab them with the bayonet to kill them properly. The execution lasts more than 20 minutes. Later on, the jewels sewn into the clothing and hidden in the house are found. Whatever was found in the house Ipatiev, and in the pit of the mine, was packed and sent to Vladivostok through the Trans-Siberian. The jewels disappeared. Someone must have stolen no one knows how. A lot of the jewels buried in Tobolsk, the first place the imperial family stayed, emerge as well. A nun breaks down following lengthy torture and discloses the location of the valuables. Four containers filled with jewels are dug up. The jewels were taken, photographed, and then disappeared, stolen. But not all of the imperial family's jewels are found. The other boxes are still in Tobolsk, somewhere in the monasteries around. With this of jewels, twice, we don't know where. In the Caucasus, Grand Duchess Vladimir realizes she is unable to return to St. Petersburg, where she has money and jewels locked away in the safe in the Vladimir Palace. She was determined to try and get these jewels out, and she was helped here by her son Boris, and they had this friend called Albert Stopford. Albert Stopford was a remarkable figure, because for all his rather dandy-ish appearance, he must have been quite a strong character and quite a brave man. Albert Stopford is British, and with his diplomatic status, can move freely in chaotic Russia. He dresses like a workman and sneaks into the Vladimir Palace after dark. So he got in at night, and he took with him two big Gladstone bags, and he went to the safe, and he took everything out of the safe, and he managed to get these bags with the jewels. One of them apparently had 25 tiaras, so this was delicate cargo, fragile, and heavy. And how to pretend that you're a workman carrying a bag of old plumber's tools, when in fact you're carrying that kind of cargo. And that was the easy part, because then he had two big problems, jewels and cash. And so the money had to be got to her, and the jewels had to be got out of Russia. Stopford runs the risk of being shot should he be caught with his bags stuffed with jewels. He probably hides them with the director of the Imperial Academy of Arts. The Bolsheviks are keeping a close eye on Stopford, so he has problems getting the Grand Duchess's jewels out of Russia. But finally, a solution presents itself. The British Navy has been on manoeuvres in the area and is withdrawing its troops. As luck will have it, one of the marines is also named Stopford. As a diversion, this marine is sent back to England via Siberia, Japan, and America. And the next day, Stopford the gentleman picks up the jewels at the Academy of Arts and travels the short distance across Europe to England, where he places the valuables in a safe deposit box in a bank. Several of the members of the Imperial family are in the Crimea under house arrest, far from the disturbances in the major cities. Following the murder of Rasputin, Felix Yusupov and Arina are in the Crimea in their large summer residence. But the couple are not under house arrest like other members of the Imperial family. Because he wasn't an imperial prince, and my aunt was considered not imperial because she'd married him, Felix was considered by the Bolsheviks not to be of importance, or such importance, the Romanovs. So he was able to travel around from Moscow to St. Petersburg to the Crimea without being totally detected, unlike my great-grandmother Maria Dagma, that were under house arrest on their estate. Arina's grandmother, the Dowager Empress, has left her largest and most magnificent jewels in St. Petersburg, as she thought her stay in the Crimea would be a short one. She has only brought her everyday jewels to the Crimea. Felix decides to get Dagma's jewels out of St. Petersburg, among others her favorite tiara with pearls and diamonds. Felix went to her palace in St. Petersburg to look for her jewels, and he found that they'd already been taken, her big pieces of jewels. So he was the unfortunate person that had to go back to the Crimea and tell my great-grandmother that the jewels had already been found and gone. Dagma refuses to believe her son is dead. The brutal murder of Nicholas II and his family seals the final fall of the Russian Empire. The situation is chaotic, and in April 1919, Dagma's nephew, the English king, decides to get his aunt and her family out of Russia. King George V sent the battleship Marlborough, which took out Felix and my aunt, the Dowager Empress, my grandmother, and all my grandmother's younger children, along with some other grand dukes and grand duchesses. It was apparently totally crammed to the gills. The Dowager Empress is proving rather troublesome when the captain tries to get her on board. He said, look, the Bolsheviks are a few miles down the road, and if they find you, they will kill you, and you have no choice. And eventually, she agreed that she would go. And she stood on the stern of this large warship, the HMS Marlborough, and they pulled away. And she never took her eyes off Russia. And they passed another, another ship coming in another direction with white Russians on board. And when they saw who it was standing in the stern, they broke into this Irish national anthem. And then eventually she came back to London, and she became rather a nuisance. So they were quite happy to pack her off back to Denmark. As Empress of Russia, Dagma was wearing magnificent jewels. In 1919, she is back in her country with nothing but her everyday jewels. She does not even have a tiara. My great grandmother, Maria Dagma, only had her small bits of jewelry, which compared to most peoples were actually quite large, because I got to see some of them. It was considered, I mean, you know, little trifles that you wear every day. And not only her, but her two daughters live for 50 years on this little box of nothing. Back in the Caucasus, the Grand Duchess Vladimir has heard the terrible news about the execution of the imperial family, and that Empress Dagma has left. In 1920, the Grand Duchess Vladimir has to accept that she has to leave Russia. It is simply too dangerous for her to stay, and she travels the 500 miles to the Black Sea in her own train. She eventually managed to make her way out of Russia through Annapa, and they went actually then to Italy, because the alternative was to go directly to Constantinople, because that was a more direct route. But they were searched for fleas, and she felt that was far too ignominious and undignified, so they went instead on an Italian ship, and they weren't searched. Her good friend Albert Stompford receives her in Venice. He escorts her to the French spa town where she has gone to take the waters numerous times. And then when she arrived in North Seville with all the pressures and all the horrors and all the doubts and all the pace of change and the declination of her circumstances, she was very weak, and she died in North Seville in 1920. The Grand Duchess is buried in the Russian Orthodox Church she herself had built nine years earlier. Felix and Irina, who escaped and left Russia with Daumar, have settled in Paris. Just like the Dowager Empress, they were unable to bring the family's enormous collection of jewels out of the country. But a pleasant surprise awaits them on arrival in Paris. Most of the family jewels are hidden in the Yusupov's palaces, in Russia. Felix had started concealing the family treasures in 1917. Felix had an incredible amount of valuables, not just the most amazing collection of jewels, but paintings and artworks and china and everything. And he decided, being very far thinking, that the thing to do was to hide them away by building secret rooms. The servants that did it for him were incredibly trustworthy, and they hid an most incredible amount. Over a thousand paintings went into these rooms, but they did different bits in the palace. The Soviet state has taken over all the Yusupov's houses and buildings and are converting them into public offices. In the palace in Moscow, one of the workers makes a major find. Amongst the jewels they found was the sunburst tiara that he'd given my aunt as a wedding present. Chumet's sunburst tiara, the many unique diamond necklaces, the Cartier crystal tiara, as well as numerous jewels of the highest quality, are now going to be lost forever. In one of the photos, the tiara belonging to Irina is being stripped of emeralds and diamonds. The Bolsheviks didn't want the little jewels, they only wanted the big stones that were the size of pigeon eggs and cherries. So what they did with the little ones, I do not know, but they prized out all the big stones that went to auction to raise money for them. Following the confiscation, all Felix has left of the jewels that have been brutally destroyed are the memories and the drawings in his scrapbook. That is one of the few things that Yusupov took out of Russia, and 60 years after his wedding, he painted on the drawings the color of the stone, because he remembered that this barrier had been emeralds, this barrier had been sapphire, so he would paint red, blue, white, green, whatever, to remind what the stones were, 60 years after his marriage. Felix stubbornly holds on to the world's most beautiful pearl, La Pellegrina, to the bitter end, but in 1953 he is forced to sell that as well. The pearl is not seen again until 1987, when it is sold at Christie's for 463,800 dollars. The buyer is anonymous, and the pearl's destiny is unknown. In a very short time, the Soviet government has confiscated jewels, gemstones, gold, silver, and art for billions of dollars. The Soviet regime was bankrupt, there was no money, they were invaded by everywhere, by the West Russians, by the British, by the French, I mean they were on the verge of collapsing, so they needed money. In the 1920s, Immanuel Snowman, who owned Wartski, was one of the first to go out there and buy up all my family's artworks, and particularly the Fabergé eggs. Snowman is allowed to buy 12 eggs. Today, the Fabergé Easter eggs are considered almost irreplaceable. In 2004, Russian businessman Viktor Vekselberg buys nine Fabergé eggs from an American collector for 90 million dollars. And they are all in a museum in Russia now, as a result of this man's generosity, because he wanted them to come back to their home. The Soviet system is in need of enormous sums of money for propaganda and to support the World Revolution. And the imperial jewels bring in a fortune when they are sold at various auction houses all over Europe. It was the best way to get the more attention possible and the many buyers. To sell it privately, it would take years, because it was such an amount of jewels that no one would have the money to buy. So it was better to advertise all over the world that the Russian jewels would be sold. And it would attract attention and all the buyers of all over the world, which it did. The imperial splendor is sold to the highest bidder. 11,000 pounds, 500, 11,000, any more? Empress Dauma's tiara with pearls and diamonds, the one that Felix tried in vain to retrieve at her palace, is sold at the Christie's auction house. And this was bought at the time by Gladys, Duchess of Marlborough. Gladys has come to London from America and has married the 9th Duke of Marlborough. The marriage only lasts a short while, and so does her ownership of Empress Dauma's tiara. And it went from owner to owner, from owner to owner. And the last owner and the last buyer was Madame Imelda Marcos, and it's supposedly still in her safe. In 1978, the Philippines' first lady had no doubts about the special story of this tiara, and she just had to have it. Dauma's tiara, now in the possession of Imelda Marcos, was one of the many jewels exhibited before the great sale. Only a few of the precious objects from this exhibition are still in existence. The Soviet government sold off all the jewels that they had, and they sold off the crown that the last Empress wore at her coronation. Of course, as they had got rid of the family, there was no point in keeping the jewels, and they needed the money anyway. One of the Empress's crowns is sold and hasn't been seen since. The diamond-studded bridal crown, worn by all the Grand Duchesses on their wedding day, can be seen at the Hillwood Museum in Washington, D.C. The strange thing is that Trotsky insisted on keeping the most historical piece, the reminders of the Empire, that they should have hated it. No, they kept it. Today, the Tsar's enormous crown and regalia, all worn by Nicholas II at his coronation in 1896, as well as the remaining Empress's crown, can be seen in the Moscow Kremlin. The Swedish Foreign Office is tidying up one of their archives, and finds two pillar cases marked, Property of Grand Duchess Vladimir. Inside are more than 100 valuable objects, a substantial number of them made by the finest artisans of Russia, Fabergé and Boleyn. These are not jewels, these are men's things, many of which actually belong to my great-grandfather. These are cigarette cases, cufflinks, the sort of things that men would wear. The director of the Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg had been looking after the pillow cases since Stobford smuggled them out of the Vladimir Palace along with the Grand Duchess's jewels. Following the Communist takeover, the director hands them over to the neutral Swedish legation in the city, which sends them by courier to be deposited at the archives in Stockholm. And they suddenly rang up Prince Nikola Romanov, and they said to him, we found all these treasures after 90 years. His first view was to inquire, none too gently, what on earth the Swedes have been doing with them for 90 years. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome here at Sotheby's, at today's sales, the Romanov heirlooms. I've never sold a pillow case before, but here it is, the first one, bidding here with a lot of interest. I have to start with 3,500, 3,000. And sold. Thank you very much. 500,000, your bid at 500,000 in advance of 500,000, your run, last chance, selling for 500,000. And it's sold. Thank you, sir. We decided the best thing to do would be to sell them, and they were sold by Sotheby's, and it was extraordinary. I went into Sotheby's and saw them, and there they all were, and rather amazing, there was one particular box, case, about this size, with two little portrait miniatures of my grandparents. It was a rather extraordinary sort of green striped box made by Fabergé for, well, actually Vladimir. And it's very unusual in these days to find anything of that era that's never been seen before, or has never happened before, after 90 years. So it promoted a great deal of interest. Extraordinary story. 350, 380, 400. It's a pity none of us could afford to keep. At 480, I'm going to sell it. Your run, last chance, for 480,000 pounds. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. The sale brought in 7 million pounds. Following the death of Grand Duchess Vladimir in 1920, her four children inherit the magnificent jewels that Stopford smuggled out of Russia, risking his life in the process. It is because of him the English Queen Elizabeth can wear the famous Vladimir tiara today. Welcome, your Royal Highnesses, on your first official visit to the United Kingdom. None of the Grand Duchess's imposing jewels are in the possession of her descendants today. The children had to sell them to survive. New owners are found discreetly all over the world in the Cartier customer files. Among these jewels which were sold was the famous emerald necklace of Grand Duchess Vladimir. Part of it was remounted by Cartier for Barbara Hutton. Part of it ended in another setting for Elizabeth Taylor, who wore Grand Duchess Vladimir's emeralds. It is Elizabeth Taylor's husband Richard Burton who buys the rare emeralds and gives them to his wife. The Grand Duchess's impressive sapphire tiara is sold to King Ferdinand of Romania. In 1931, Maria of Romania gives the sapphire tiara as a wedding present to her daughter, Ileana. Following World War II, Ileana flees Romania with her family. They settle in America and to raise money for the education of her children, Ileana sells the tiara. The gems have probably been sold separately later on. The tiara has never been seen since. Grand Duchess Vladimir's daughter, Helena, who lives in exile with her husband Prince Nicholas of Greece, sells her mother's favourite tiara, the Vladimir tiara, to Queen Mary of England for £28,000. Queen Mary wears her new tiara at the opening of the British Parliament in 1924. It's an amazing tiara which is called in the family the convertible tiara because it has huge circles of diamonds and inside the circle you can you can put a drop like that and there were pearls and there were emeralds so it was called the convertible tiara because you could take all the drops out and put another colour in like that. Queen Mary adds a new variation to the tiara. 100 years earlier her grandmother had won 40 emeralds at a charity lottery and Mary's unmarried brother Frank has given all of them to his mistress. Following his death in 1910, Mary has managed to get the Cambridge emeralds back and they are now mounted in the Vladimir tiara. Today it is Queen Mary's granddaughter Queen Elizabeth II who frequently wears the tiara. The Vladimir tiara is the last of the great treasures telling the story of the unique jewels once found in the realm of the Tsar. Today most of these imperial masterpieces have either been stolen, destroyed or have completely disappeared. But no matter where they are today, they bear silent witness to both the magnificence and the fall of the Tsar's empire.