Queen Adelaide's Sunray Diadem

Franz Xaver Winterhalter painted Queen Victoria wearing this mysterious piece at the baptism of her son Prince Arthur, later Duke of Connaught and Strathearn. Experts like Geoffrey Munn, author of the Victoria & Albert Museum publication Tiaras: Past and Present, are careful to distinguish it from the "George III fringe tiara," but it still gets confused for it by some observers. Royal Collection author Sir Hugh Roberts and bloggers like the Court Jeweller, for example, seem to use the "Sunray" and "fringe" descriptions interchangeably, or to call it a "Sunray fringe," and in fairness, the "sunray" design is a "fringe-like" style. However, it is important to note that the headpiece in the famous "Magi" portrait by Winterhalter is not the Hanoverian/George III fringe necklace/tiara nor is it Queen Mary's Fringe Tiara, another piece the sunray diadem is often mistaken for. The Court Jeweller blog has pictures of Queen Mary wearing both tiaras side-by-side so you can see the differences.

The Royal Collection Trust (RCT) calls it a sunray diadem "said to have been made by Rundell's for Queen Adelaide," consort of Queen Victoria's uncle and predecessor, William IV. Another royal jewel expert and the former director of the Royal Collection, Sir Hugh Roberts, explains that the Sunray Diadem was bequeated to Victoria by her aunt Queen Adelaide after the death of King William IV. Roberts confirms that it was indeed made by Rundell, having been commissioned by the King for his consort in 1831. 1,456 brilliant diamonds, dismantled from jewelry that belonged to King William's parents, form the "sunray" motif. Furthermore, writes Roberts, there are "sixty brilliant-set graduated bars, the central bars terminating in cushion-cut and pear-shaped stones, divided by 60 graduated brilliant set spikes; an extra six small graduated bars and five spikes detached; tiara fittings removed." Roberts also calls it a necklace. One of the pieces that provided the diamonds had been a necklace and the diadem itself seems to have been convertible as such.

Queen Victoria wore the diadem to the Drury Lane Theatre in 1837 and to the Inauguration of the Great Exhibition, 1851. For the opening of the latter event, Her Majesty herself wrote about it in her diary, calling it a "diamond ray diadem." It was part of the Crown inventory of "the Queen's jewels" in 1858. An inventory of the "Crown Jewels" conducted by Garrard in 1897 called it a "necklace, fringe pattern, set with Brilliants … formerly the property of George III." Queen Alexandra, consort of Edward VII, wore it (on her waste) for the coronation in 1902. Sir Hugh claims that Queen Mary also wore it "in the early years of her reign." Occasionally, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother wore it as a necklace.