This 140-Carat Regent Diamond Spared In Louvre Heist Is Linked To Kohinoor: Here's Its India Connection

Earlier this week, the Louvre Museum in Paris was targeted in a daylight heist, with jewels worth around $100 million stolen. The heist, completed within minutes on Sunday, targeted eight pieces from France’s royal collection, including crowns, necklaces and brooches dating back to King Francis I.

However, one priceless gem that was spared in this heist was the 140.6-carat diamond mined centuries ago in Andhra Pradesh. This diamond, one of the largest in Europe, was part of the French royal collection and survived revolutions and wars before being placed in the Louvre in 1887.

Once owned by King Louis XIV, the Regent Diamond is one of the most famous gems in the world. The cushion-cut stone weighing 140.6 carats has a faint blue-green tint and is reportedly valued at $60 million. In comparison, one of history's most famous and controversial diamonds, the Kohinoor weighs 105.6 carats. Both diamonds trace their origins to the same region.

Like the famed Kohinoor, now part of the British crown jewels, the Regent Diamond was discovered in the Kollur mine in the Golconda region of Andhra Pradesh. At the time of its discovery in 1698, it weighed 426 carats. According to a popular legend, the miner who found it hid the stone in a wound in his leg to smuggle it out.

He tried to seek help from a sea captain to flee the country with the diamond, but he was betrayed and killed. The diamond was later noticed by Thomas Pitt, then Governor of Madras, who purchased the rough stone and had it cut in England between 1704 and 1706.

In 1717, France’s Regent Philippe d’Orléans acquired it, giving the gem its famous name. By 1719, its value had already tripled. Several smaller stones from the original gem were sold to Russia’s Tsar Peter the Great.

The Regent also adorned the crowns of French monarch Louis XV, who wore it during his coronation in 1722 and often displayed it on his hat. The diamond then found its place on the crown of Louis XVI in 1775, which was later moved to his hat.

It was stolen in 1792 and then found again a year later. Over the years, the diamond was pledged several times by the Directory and the Consulate before Napoleon Bonaparte reclaimed it in 1801. It then decorated his ceremonial sword as First Consul and, later, as Emperor in 1812.

As regimes changed, the Regent diamond was seen on the crowns of Louis XVIII, Charles X and Napoleon III and later on the Greek diadem of Empress Eugenie, the wife of Napoleon III.

Social media is abuzz with theories about why the Regent Diamond was spared in the Louvre heist. Many claimed that the gem is cursed, linking its ominous past to Marie Antoinette, who was executed during the French Revolution, and other ill-fated royals who once owned it.