Queen Ingrid's rubies

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Queen Ingrid wearing the rubies:

In the jewelcase belonging to the Dowager Queen of Denmark, Queen Ingrid, born a princess of Sweden, there was a Parisian parure in rubies and diamonds that once belonged to Queen Desiree of Sweden, Queen Ingrid's ancestor. Not that Queen Ingrid brought the rubies with her to Denmark at her wedding in 1935. They arrived with Louisa, consort of Frederic VIII, mother of Queen Ingrid's father-in-law, King Christian X. Like Queen Ingrid, Queen Louisa was born a princess of Sweden. But the jewels have an interesting history.

In 1804 as Napoleon planned his coronation giving his marshals great sums of money to buy modern jewelry for their wives, he wanted the eyes of the world riveted on Paris, again, as the center of good taste; he wanted the royal houses of Europe to become customers again of the Parisian jewelers. In the years of revolution Paris did not play that role and the coronation, therefore, was a promotion again of Parisian craftmanship.

One of Napoleon's marshals, Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, married to a former fiancee of Napoleon, Desiree Clary from Marseiles, bought the ruby garniture for his wife who wore it for the coronation on the 2nd of December, 1804, in the Notre Dame Cathedral.

Six years later, in 1810 Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte was adopted by King Carl XIII of  Sweden and in 1818 he succeeded his new father to the throne. Thus Desiree, the silk merchant's daughter from Marseilles, became Queen of Sweden. Bernadotte died in 1844 but his wife lived till 1860. In her will she left the rubies to her daughter-in-law, Queen Josefina - her son, King Oscar I, having died the year before. Josefina was born a princess of Leuchtenberg, daughter of Napoleon's stepson, Eugene de Beauharnais, Duke of Leuchtenberg, one-time viceroy of Italy, and Amalie Augusta, Princess of Bavaria.

When in 1869 Queen Josefina's grandchild, Louisa, married the Crown Prince of Denmark, later King Frederic VIII, she was given the parure as a wedding present from her grandmother. In 1876 Queen Josefina died and in her will she left "the Danish colours for Louisa". Red and white like the Danish flag, the Dannebrog. So Louisa brought the ruby treasure to the Danish royal family.

In 1898 Louisa gave the tiara to her daughter-in-law, Alexandrine, Duchess of Mecklenberg-Schwerin, who married her eldest son, later King Christian X. He inherited the rest of the parure when his mother died in 1926.

In 1935 the whole parure was given as a wedding gift to our aforementioned Princess Ingrid of Sweden who married their eldest son, later King Frederic IX. Therefore the rubies were Queen Ingrid's private jewels and not part of the crown jewellery. She therefore could leave the parure by will to her grandchild Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark. When he married Miss Mary Donaldson in 2004 he gave it to her to wear.

Today the ensemble consists of a tiara, large earrings, a very grandiose collier, a stomacher and an armring. Two shoulder brooches were dismantled and used by Queen Ingrid to alter the tiara around 1947. Until then the tiara had been two twigs set on a shackle. Originally there were perhaps more bouquets to place in the hair and on the dress.