Origin of name
Nur-ul-Ain in the Persian and Arabic languages mean "the
light of the eye". This is the name given by the Persians, probably after
the arrival of the stone in Persia, together with the loot plundered by
Nadir Shah and his men, after the capture and sacking of Delhi and Agra in
1739. The name by which the diamond was known while it remained with the the
Mogul Emperors in India is not known.
Characteristics of the
stone
The diamond is a pale pink, oval brilliant-cut stone,
weighing around 60 carats, and having dimensions of 30 x 26 x 11 mm.
Being a pink diamond, the Nur-ul Ain is a type IIa
diamond, free of nitrogen impurities, but the crystal had undergone plastic
deformation during it's formation and subsequent rise to the surface from
deep inside the earth. The plastically deformed areas absorb visible light
in a particular region of the visible spectrum that imparts the pink color.
However their occurrence is much less than 0.1 % of all naturally occurring
diamonds. In fact in the Argyle mines in Western Australia, the mine that
produces most of the pink diamonds in the world today, only one carat of
pink diamond is produced for every 1,000,000 carats of rough diamonds. This
works out to an astonishingly low occurrence of 0.0001 %.
The "Nur-ul-Ain" and the "Darya-i-Nur" (Ocean of Light)
diamonds are two of the most celebrated diamonds among the Iranian Crown
Jewels. The "Nur-ul-Ain" adorns the tiara designed by Harry Winston for
Empress Farah Diba's wedding to Mohammed Reza Shah Pahlavi, the last Shah of
Iran, in 1958. The Darya-i-Nur is mounted on an elaborate frame, set with
457 diamonds and 4 rubies, surmounted by the Aryan symbols of the lion and
the sun, a unique setting that was designed and executed during the
reign of Shah Nasser-ed-din (1848-1896).
The Nur-ul-Ain and the Darya-i-Nur are believed to be
non-identical twins of the same rare, pale pink, enormous, 400-carat
diamond, referred to as "Diamanta Grande Table" (the Great Table Diamond),
by Jean Baptiste Tavernier, the 17th century French traveler and jeweler,
who had seen it at Golconda in Andhra Pradesh, South India, in 1642. A team
of Canadian experts from the Royal Ontario Museum, who conducted research on
the Iranian Imperial Jewels in 1965, postulated that the Darya-i-Nur is the
major portion of the Great Table Diamond seen by Tavernier in 1642 and later
mounted on the Peacock Throne of Mogul Emperor Shah Jahaan (1628-58), which
was later plundered by the Persian conqueror Nadir Shah in 1739. The other
piece of the Great Table diamond is thought to have been re-cut, to yield
the oval, pale pink, 60-carat, brilliant-cut stone, known as the Nur-ul-Ain.
Early history
The Nur-ul-Ain is therefore undoubtedly a 17th century
stone, that originated in the famous Kollur mines, near Golconda, in
Andhra Pradesh, Southern India, and as pointed out earlier, the lesser
portion of the Great Table diamond, that entered Shah Jahaan's court in the
mid 17th century. However, it is not known precisely when the Great Table
diamond was cleaved to yield two diamonds. Was it when the stone was still
in India? or, was it after it's arrival in Persia, perhaps still mounted
on Shah Jahaan's Peacock Throne? It is generally believed that the Great
Table diamond was already transformed into the Darya-i-Nur and the
Nur-ul-Ain, when Nadir Shah plundered the jewels and other valuables of the
Mogul Emperors of India, including the jewel studded Peacock Throne of Shah
Jahaan, the most splendorous throne ever made in the history of mankind.
In the immediate aftermath of Nadir Shah's assassination
in June 1747, by his own troops, most of his treasurers were plundered by
his revolting troops, including the Darya-i-Nur and the Nur-ul- Ain. The
vast empire created by Nadir Shah crumbled into several independent states,
and inside Iran itself three different states emerged. One state was the
Afsharid State based in Khorasan, with it's capital at Mashhad, and headed
by Nadir Shah's blind grandson Shah Rukh, who ruled from 1748 to 1795. The
second state was situated at Mazanderan (Tabarestan) in Northern Iran, south
of the Caspian Sea and was headed by the Qajar Chief Muhammad Hassan Khan
Qajar. The third state was based in Central and Southern Iran, with it's
capital in Shiraz and was headed by Muhammad Karim Khan Zand of the Zand
dynasty. Each of the above rulers must have laid their hands upon part of
the treasurers of Nadir Shah.
Karim Khan's state was the most successful of the three
states in terms of peace, popular contentment and economic prosperity. After
Karim Khan's death in 1779, Agha Muhammad Khan Qajar gathered a large force
in Mazanderan and embarked on a war of conquest in the South. He subdued the
Zand territory after defeating Lotf Ali Khan in 1794. In 1796 Agha Muhammad
Khan Qajar assumed the imperial diadem as Shahanshah (King of Kings) and
later in the same year he captured Mashhad, and took Shah Rukh prisoner.
Shah Rukh was subjected to the most horrifying and
painful torture and forced to surrender all the treasurers acquired after
Nadir Shah's death, which finally resulted in his death. The treasurers
re-assembled by Agha Muhammad Khan Qajar after defeating Lotf Ali Khan and
Shah Rukh included the Darya-i-Nur, the Nur-ul-Ain, Shah diamond, Taj-i-Mah
etc. However Agha Muhammad Khan Qajar did not live long to enjoy his
re-assembled treasurers. The very next year in 1797 he was assassinated by
his own servants, while on an expedition to Georgia.
Modern history
The Iranian Crown Jewels then passed down a succession of
rulers which included Fath Ali Shah (1797-1834), Muhammad Shah (1834-48),
Nasser-ed-din Shah (1848-96), Mozaffar-al-Din Shah (1896-1907), and finally
Muhammad Ali Shah (1907-1909). Muhammad Ali Shah in his attempt to suppress
the National Consultative Assembly granted by his predecessor Mozaffar-al-Din
Shah, after the Constitutional Revolution in 1906, was defeated and forced
to seek refuge in the Russian legation. He carried with him the Iranian
Crown Jewels, and claimed that the jewels were his personal property.
However due to the untiring efforts of the revolutionaries, and
representations made to the Russian government, the Iranian Crown Jewels
were restored back to Iran.
Iran's experiment with democracy was short lived, lasting
only about 15 years from 1906 to 1921. The collapse of democracy in Iran was
mainly due to the interference of the British and the Russians who carved
out spheres of influence in the country. The Russians withdrew from Iran
after the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, but the British continued to
maintain an interest in Iran, until they were forced to withdraw their
advisers in 1921 due to international pressure. However, in 1921, an Iranian
Officer of the Persian Cossack Brigade, Reza Khan, staged a coup and took
control of all the military forces of Iran. Reza Khan consolidated his
position first as War Minister and later as Prime Minister under Ahmad Shah,
and eventually deposed Ahmad Shah in 1925, and had himself crowned as Reza
Shah Pahlavi. Thus the Shah rulers of Iran who were only nominal Heads
of State after the constitutional revolution of 1906, were effectively
restored as absolute monarchs in 1925.
Reza Shah Pahlavi laid the foundations of a modern state
in Iran by introducing educational and judicial reforms. He also
re-negotiated the oil concessions given to western countries. But, his
suspicions of the British and the Russians, forced him to move closer to
Nazi Germany, which resulted in the Anglo-Soviet invasion of his country in
1941, under the pretext of ensuring the safe passage of U.S. war material to
the
Soviet Union through Iran. The Allies forced Reza Shah to abdicate, placing
his young son Mohammed Reza Shah Pahlavi on the throne. After the war the
National Front consisting of nationalists, clerics, and non-communist left
wing parties led by Mohammed Mosaddeq, a career politician and lawyer, was
elected to power, and Mosaddeq nationalized the country's oil industry.
Britain and the U.S. immediately swung into action and planned a joint coup
to oust Mosaddeq. In August 1953 Shah Mohammed Reza fled the country after
quarrels with the Prime Minister Mosaddeq came to a head. Almost
simultaneously the C.I.A. plotted coup succeeded, and Mousaddeq's
Government was ousted. Within a week Shah Mohammed Reza returned to Iran and
appointed a new Prime Minister. Shah Mohammed Reza then moved immediately
to consolidate his position as the absolute monarch of Iran.
In 1958, when Shah Mohammed Reza married Empress Farah
Diba, a special tiara was designed by Harry Winston for the occasion. The
centerpiece of this tiara was the Nur-ul-Ain diamond, one of the largest
pink diamonds in the world. The diamond is set in platinum, and is
surrounded by other diamonds in shades of pink, yellow and colorless, with a
row of colored baguette diamonds lining the base of the Tiara. The
Nur-ul-Ain weighed around 60 carats, and the other diamonds weighed between
14 to 19 carats each. The tiara contains a total of 324 diamonds.
Present owners of the
diamond
The diamond became part of the Iranian Crown Jewels in
1739 and remains so up to this day. It is one of the most celebrated
diamonds in the collection. Empress Farah Diba's tiara is still preserved in
it's original setting, with the Nur-ul Ain as the centerpiece.
