His description of the imperial crown concludes: "and uppon the topp a very greate ballace perced." We know this to be our stone for at some point in time it had been drilled ('perced') at the top with a small hole, so as to be worn suspended from the neck, a common occurrence with oriental gems. King James I had the stone set in his state-crown, for the Earl of Dorset describes the stone in an inventory of the crown jewels. She replied 'If Queen Mary would follow her counsels she would get them both in time and all she had, but she would send a diamond as a token by me.'" It was for the Black Prince's Ruby that the envoy begged, but Mary was destined to get neither. I desired she would either send it to my queen or the Earl of Leicester's picture. One evening the Queen took him into her bedchamber, where "she shewed me a fair ruby, great like a racket-ball. She did show it to a Scottish envoy, Sir James Melville, however. Two deep gashes are readily visible, bearing mute testimony to the gallantry of Henry V on that fateful day.įrom here the precious gem passed through the hands of numerous British kings, including Henry VIII and his daughter, Elizabeth I, who kept it in her private collection. The identical helmet worn by Henry at Avincourt is said to reside in Westminster Abbey, shorn of its jewels. After the battle, a French prisoner retrieved the broken fragment and brought it back to England, an act for which he was duly reimprisoned. Miraculously, though, both the stone and Henry survived. Others also attacked him, even managing to break away a portion of the crown. The Frenchman struck his helmet a mighty blow with his battle axe, nearly killing Henry. Henry's helmet was more than mere decoration, for on that day he was set upon by the French prince, Duc d'Alençon. Upon his helmet was a crown garnished with rubies, sapphires and pearls, including the Black Prince's Ruby. The morning of the climactic battle Henry appeared dressed in most splendid attire, with gilt armor.
The gallant king, with his army reduced to 15,000 men, was falling back upon Calais when at Agincourt he encountered Duc d'Alençon, the French prince, and his army of 50,000 men. The gem reappeared in the hands of the English king, Henry V, at Agincourt, on Oct. Henry was duly defeated and the large red stone passed as payment to the Black Prince, in 1367.Įdward, the "Black Prince." Illustration from Cassell (1902). Don Pedro beseeched the Black Prince to help, promising untold treasures in return. In 1366, he fled to Bordeaux, where Edward of Woodstock (a.k.a. It is today known as the Black Prince's Ruby.ĭon Pedro soon found it his turn to flee, his adversary being none other than his own brother, Henry. Among the jewels was a large red spinel octahedron, the size of an egg. When they arrived to negotiate, Abu Said and his attendants were killed, and their jewels seized. Don Pedro's army eventually brought Abu Said to heel. Don Pedro the Cruel ruled nearby Seville, and it was to him that Mohammed fled after being deposed by his brother-in-law, Abu Said.
At that time, Spain was ruled by a number of petty kings, one of whom was a Moorish prince, Mohammed, of Granada. The following account, largely taken from Richard Hughes' 1997 book, Ruby & Sapphire, tells the tale of this extraordinary gem.Īlthough the gem was probably mined at Kuh-i-Lal (Badakhshan's famous balas ruby mines) in what is now Tajikistan, the gem's first documented appearance is in fourteenth-century Spain. The Black Prince's Rubyįew precious stones have such a long and storied history as the Black Prince's ruby, a large, semi-polished, crimson orb that today sits on the front of Britain's Imperial State Crown. The history of the Black Prince's Ruby, one of the world's most famous precious stones.
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