The Crown of Princess Blanche , also known as the Crown of Palatine or the Bohemian Crown, is England's oldest royal crown dating from around 1370. The crown belonged to the daughter of King Henry IV , Princess Blanche (Blanca) of England and is a magnificent example of jewelry from the second half of the 14th century. It is stored in the Munich treasury .
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| Princess Blanche Crown . 1370s | ||
| English Crown of princess blanche | ||
| gold, precious stones, pearls, enamel, filigree, inlay. 18 × 18 cm | ||
| Munich residence | ||
Description
The crown is made of gold and richly decorated with sapphires, rubies, diamonds and pearls. It consists of a hoop and twelve crowns crowning it in the form of heraldic lilies , alternating in height. Under each tooth there is a composition of precious stones in the shape of a hexagon - alternating rubies and pearls in the corners and sapphires of individual shape and transparency in the center of each element; gold compounds worked out by enamel.
At the end of the fourteenth century, the crown became somewhat higher, thanks to elongated phlerons , which replaced smaller phlerons.
History
The crown was made around 1370 or several years later; the first record about it dates back to 1399, the crown appears in the list of jewels belonging to the ousted king Richard II . Thus, it is unlikely that the crown was made for Blanca , most likely, it originally belonged to Queen Anne of Czech , the first wife of Richard. The place where the crown was made is not known for certain - Anna could have brought the crown to England from Prague; although some elements indicate the French origin of the product, the author could have been a jeweler trained in France, who worked in Prague. It has been suggested that the crown comes from Venice.
In 1402, Princess Blanca of England married Ludwig III , Elector of the Palatinate ( Elector Palatine ) and the crown became the property of the Wittelsbach house as a bride dowry. The crown owes this to its names - the Crown of Princess Blanche or the Crown of Palatine (i.e. the Palatinate).
Since 1782, the crown has been kept in the Munich residence.
Literature
- V.N.Singaevsky. The most legendary jewels of the world of all time. The stones. Crowns. Decorations - AST, 2013
- Cherry, John, in: Jonathan Alexander & Paul Binski (eds), Age of Chivalry, Art in Plantagenet England, 1200-1400 , Catalog number 16, Royal Academy / Weidenfeld & Nicholson, London 1987
- Harper, Elizabeth, Pearl in the Context of Fourteenth-Century Gift Economies , The Chaucer Review, Volume 44, Number 4, 2010, pp. 421-439, Penn State University Press, DOI: 10.1353 / cr.0.0044