After 165 years of pilgrimage around the world, the Estrela do Sul diamond, the largest and most famous diamond in Brazil of all time, is currently in an uncertain and unknown location. Fate ignored. As is known, diamonds are eternal.
The journey of the diamond began in 1853, in a mine in the city of Bagagem, in Minas Gerais. Legend has it that it was discovered on a mound of gravel by a slave named Rosa who, as a reward, obtained freedom and a lifetime pension. Of rare beauty and weighing 261,24 carats, it was sold by Mr. Casimiro Morais, owner of the mine, for just 3 pounds at the time.
Sales and resales took the stone to Amsterdam, where it was purchased for US$35. It was then that the diamond was polished and reduced to 128,48 carats. The stone's degree of purity is one of the highest in terms of international classification, and its slight greenish-pink hue caught the attention of Halphen & Associates, from Paris, which acquired it and baptized it as star of the south.
After being exhibited at the world expositions in London, in 1862, and Paris, in 1867, it was sold in India for US$400 to Prince Mulhar Rao Gaekwad, Maharaja of Baroda, who assembled it together with another famous diamond, the English Dresden Diamond, in a necklace that gathered her family's jewels.
After decades in possession of the opulent Indian maharajahs, the princely family, in crisis, sold the diamond in 1999 to the firm Rustomjee Jamsetjee, from Mumbai, which then sold it to Maison Cartier, from Paris, in 2002.
In 2004, the year in which it was considered the 6th largest diamond in the world, Cartier announced the holding of a major auction, in which the Estrela do Sul would be the main attraction. Whether or not it was sold, neither the French press nor Cartier gave any news. Since then, no one knows where the stone is. It might even be owned by an oil sheikh, Russian or Chinese millionaire.
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