While some diamonds have well documented histories on where they came from and who owned them, there are a few other diamonds which are not as well known. One such diamond would be the Portuguese Diamond.
The Portuguese Diamond is a near flawless 127-carat, cushion-cut diamond. The diamond is shaped in an octagonal emerald shape. Much of the history of the Portuguese diamond is pure fiction and there is no true documentation on where the diamond was mined.
To start off with, the Portuguese Diamond might not even be from Portuguese. There is a story that the stone was mined in Brazil and later became part of the Portuguese Crown Jewels. The legend probably gave the diamond its name. Unfortunately, there is no documentation to substantiate a Brazilian origin or any connection to the Portuguese royalty. It is also not clear where or from whom this story originated.
On the part of its history that is well documented, it was known that Peggy Hopkins Joyce traded a $350,000 pearl necklace for the diamond and $23,000 in cash in February 1928. She later mounted it on a diamond-studded platinum choker according to the New York Papers. Miss Joyce, who performed in the Ziegfeld Follies, had six husbands. At least five of them were known to be wealthy. Around 1946, Miss Joyce tried to sell off the diamond but the attempt was unsuccessful.
In 1951, the Portuguese Diamond was sold to Mr Harry Winston, who featured the stone as part of his "Court of Jewels" exhibition over the next few years. The diamond was sold to an international industrialist in 1957, and he later traded it back in 1962 to Mr Winston. In 1963, the Smithsonian acquired the Portuguese Diamond from Mr. Winston in exchange for 2,400 carats of small diamonds. The diamond is currently on permanent display in the Smithsonian Institute at Washington DC.
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