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Royal diamond bracelets: Customers are willing to pay a price that far exceeds the actual value of the object
Photo: MARTIAL TREZZINI / EPA
A total of 112 diamonds adorn the two bracelets of the French Queen Marie-Antoinette, which have now been auctioned in Geneva.
According to the auction house Christie's, the precious items from 140 to 150 carats changed hands within five minutes - for more than seven million euros.
Christie's had estimated the value at just 1.8 to 3.7 million euros.
Marie-Antoinette was the last queen of France before the Revolution, she was guillotined in October 1793 at the age of 37.
According to Christie's, she had commissioned the diamond bracelets from a Parisian jeweler in 1776.
Before she and her husband Louis XVI.
and tried to flee France with her children, Marie-Antoinette sent her jewels to Brussels.
From there they were later passed on to relatives in their home country Austria.
According to the expert Olivier Wagner from the auction house Sotheby's, there is currently a great demand for historical jewelry, especially among buyers from Asia.
"These are unique jewels with a unique origin," Wagner told the AFP news agency.
Customers are ready to pay "a price that far exceeds the actual value of the object" for this particular origin, for the story.
Another eagerly awaited auction is scheduled for Wednesday in Geneva.
Sotheby's offers a brooch and a pair of earrings that belonged to the Russian royal family.
The aunt of the last Tsar Nicholas II, Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna, had the jewelry smuggled out of the country after the revolution in 1917 before she fled herself in 1919.
ala / AFP