Antique Rococo Ring with Burmese Rubies and a Table-Cut Diamond, c. 1750

The world before the start of the “long 19th century”—that conceptual framework coined by historian Eric Hobsbawm, spanning from the French Revolution to the outbreak of World War I, which gave rise to our modern forms of society, democracy, and capitalism—was a completely different one. The world may have felt smaller, for it was a time before globalization. The railroad had not yet radically shortened long journeys. Luxury goods made of luxurious stones, which had traveled very long distances, were accessible only to the very few: the nobility and, in isolated cases, the bourgeoisie. The number of pieces of jewellery from that era available today is therefore not only limited to the few objects that were always carefully preserved and never altered or melted down: even the original number was significantly smaller than that of 19th-century jewellery. Rings like this one are therefore always an exciting find. At the center of the ring shines a table-cut diamond, whose rectangular shape is typical of 18th-century diamond cuts. The stone is held in a closed bezel setting typical of the period, ornamented with characteristic C-shaped curves. On either side, the diamond is flanked by a natural Burmese ruby, each set in a closed gold setting. A delicate gold band extends along the sides. A piece of jewellery crafted in a very similar style can be found in the V&A collection, M.113-1909. Pieces of jewellery of this style date to the brief heyday of the Rococo period and, in this particular design, are often of German origin, although the basic three-stone type was widespread throughout Western Europe.

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