The World's Most Famous Pearls

La Peregrina or ‘Pilgrim’ is a perfect pear-shaped pearl with a long and impressive history, first discovered in the 1500s in the Gulf of Panama by an African slave. At the time it was the largest pearl ever found, weighing an impressive 11.2g. It soon became a pearl of royalty, with Philip II of Spain gifting it to Mary I of England for their wedding, who wore it as a brooch. It was later returned to the crown jewels of Spain, and worn by various Spanish, French and Austrian royalty over the new few centuries. Via Napolean III of France, La Peregrina eventually made its way to England, where James Hamilton, Marquess and later Duke of Abercorn bought it for his wife Louisa.

The story goes that the weight of the pearl made it easy for it to fall from its necklace and go missing, getting lost in the sofas of Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle! Fortunately it was large enough to always be found again, and in 1969 Richard Burton bought the pearl at auction for Elizabeth Taylor as a Valentine’s Day gift. She apparently continued the tradition of losing it, at one point finding it being chewed on by one of her puppies! Thankfully the pearl was undamaged, and to keep it safe, Elizabeth Taylor commissioned an incredible pearl, diamond and ruby necklace to showcase La Peregrina. This eventually sold at Christies in New York in 2011 for a record $11million.

If the puppy chewing on one of the most expensive pearls in the world sounds outlandish, the story of Cleopatra’s pearl is even more so! According to Pliny the Elder in his Natural History, after many days of lavish banquets, Cleopatra made a bet with Marc Anthony that she could throw a dinner worth a small fortune. Anthony was intrigued and the wager was laid down.

Cleopatra happened to own a pair of earrings containing two largest pearls ever to have been discovered at the time. At the end of yet another lavish feast, Cleopatra had her servants bring her a glass of vinegar, dropped one of her earrings into it, and, when the pearl had dissolved, swallowed it down! Scholars and historians has questioned the validity of this account, but it certainly makes a great story. Although we would much rather wear our pearls that drink them!

After Cleopatra’s death, the remaining pearl was cut in two and used as earrings for the statue of Venus in the Pantheon in Rome. The pearls are estimated to have been worth $28.5million in today’s money.

When Marilyn Monroe married baseball star Joe DiMggio in 1954, they went to Japan on their honeymoon, and met the inventor the cultured pearl, Kokichi Mikimoto. DiMaggio bought from him a 16” pearl necklace that Mikimoto had created himself from 44 of almost perfectly matched akoya pearls, as a wedding gift for Monroe. Such as strand was the height of fashion at the time, and the uniformity of the pearls made this example all the more special.

Although the marriage lasted just 9 months, Monroe’s love for the necklace lasted much longer (she wore them to the divorce hearing as a symbol of her ongoing friendship with her soon to be ex-husband). It was one of the few pieces of jewellery that she truly treasured, and thought to be one of the few pieces she actually owned outright.

The necklace has made its way back to Mikimoto, and is now part of their travelling collection, often on display in museums and galleries around the world.