Cursed by the Gods
The Black Orlov (reputed to be more of a gunmetal grey than a true black) is classified as a black diamond weighing 67.5 carats in its present state. However, it’s said to have originally been 195 carats before it was desecrated. And “desecrated” really is the right word here.
Like the Koh-i-Noor diamond, from the little we know of its origins it’s supposed to have originally come from India. According to legend, the Black Orlov didn’t start out with this name. Instead, it was one of the eyes of a statue of the Hindu god, Brahma. Upon seeing it and being consumed with greed for the stone, a Jesuit cleric pried it from the statue and made off with it into the night. He was then, of course, pursued by the anger of the gods themselves (and probably not a few very irate Hindu priests). The Jesuit eventually threw the diamond into a river to escape (and presumably leapt in after it), but the curse of the gods was said to have followed it.
Enter: Some “History”
How it made it from the river is anyone’s guess, but in 1932 a diamond dealer by the name of J. W. Paris took it with him to the United States. Very little is known about Paris or what his state of mind was. That was almost a century ago, so as you might imagine he’s not around to ask about the jewel…though maybe not for the reasons you think. Unfortunately, even if he ate right and exercised, he wouldn’t be able to tell us much. Shortly after selling the diamond he ventured on to the top of a skyscraper in Manhattan and leapt to his death.
The next two owners, both Russian princesses, were also said to have leapt to their deaths after acquiring the diamond in the 1940s. This includes Princess Nadia Vygin-Orlov, who became the namesake for the black gem. One suicide by jumping is a tragedy, but three are a mystery.
Charles F. Winson, a New York diamond dealer, then acquired the gemstone. It’s said he was so terrified of the curse that he had the original Eye of Brahma cut into three separate stones. The one that is now known as the Black Orlov was set by Cartier with 108 smaller diamonds, then hung on a necklace of 124 diamonds.
Winson went on to display the diamond in its magnificent setting at the New York American Museum of Natural History in 1951, the Texas State Fair in Dallas in 1964, and the Diamond Pavilion in Johannesburg in 1967 before finally selling the Black Orlov and the necklace it was set in for $300,000 USD.
But Seriously, Folks…
If this all sounds like hogwash designed to bump up the value of a black rock by embellishing it with a story, that’s because it likely is.
Let’s begin by looking at the most mundane facets of the story. India is not known for producing black diamonds, so the Black Orlov was probably mined in Brazil. Owing to its cushion-cut, it was probably made in the past century, and its dull, metallic sheen would not have been popular in an Indian temple. Finally, we all know how scrupulous nobles are about keeping their pedigrees, so you’d think a Princess Nadia Vygin-Orlov would be easy to find, but in fact she appears nowhere in any official record under any variation of the name. It’s likely that Russia was chosen as the homeland for the fictitious princess because Americans would not be as familiar with the nobility there.
The real curse of this diamond, especially if it hails from Brazil, is to be found in what mining has done to the indigenous tribes and the miners who find the diamonds.
Since diamonds were first found in Brazil by Western colonialists, whole swathes of the Amazon have been reduced to red waste and empty pits. Indigenous tribes are murdered in droves in the middle of the night by businessmen eager to make money off already depleted mines. Hundreds of workers still struggle to pull diamonds from the earth by hand, only to try to sell them on to intermediate buyers who may disappear with the stones entirely to sell in European and American markets for many times over what they promised locals.
The Black Orlov, if it was birthed in Brazil, is as dark as the circumstances it was no doubt mined in.