THE AUSTRIAN YELLOW. 165
But
this story is in flat contradiction to the positive statement of J. J.
Fugger, who assures us that the diamond in question was purchased from
the Bernese Government, not by Bartholomew May, but by his own great
uncle, Jacob Fugger, head of the famous Niirenberg family of that name,
together with the " Cap of Maintenance," and other jewels belonging to
the Duke of Burgundy all for 47,000 florins.
In a curious document, illustrated by himself in 1555, and published by Lambeccius in the Bibliotheca Caesarea, Fugger
gives a detailed account of these jewels. But his description of
Charles the Bold's large diamond, which, he says, was the talk of all
Christendom,* answers to that of none of the large diamonds now extant
in Europe, and least of all to the " Florentine. He says it formed a
pyramid five-eighths of an inch square at the base, with the apex cut into a four-rayed star'm relief,
each star coinciding with the middle of each face of the pyramid. It
was the central piece in a beautiful pendant of diamonds, rubies, and
pearls, which remained for some years in the Fugger family. It thus
came into the hands of the author of the manuscript, who sold the
pendant to Henry VIII., of England, in 1547, shortly before his death.
It continued to form part of the English regalia during the reign of
Edward VI. But soon after her accession to the throne, Q ueen Mary
presented it to her husband Philip II., 1554 And thus it happened, as
Fugger remarks, that after a period of seventy-six years (1477—1554)
this diamond returned
