Editing Hope Diamond (section)

==Curse mythology==
{{More citations needed|section|date=January 2022}}

===Superstitions, publicity, marketing===
[[File:HopeDiamond.JPG|right|thumb|The Hope Diamond in the National Gem Collection in its original setting.]]
[[File:Hope Diamond from rear.jpg|thumb|Spectators gazing at the Hope Diamond seen from the rear in its case at the National Gem Collection of the Smithsonian Institution.]]
The diamond has been surrounded by a [[mythology]] of a reputed "curse" to the effect that it brings misfortune and tragedy to anyone who owns it or wears it, but there are strong indications that such fabrications enhance the stone's mystery and appeal, since increased publicity usually raised the gem's value and newsworthiness.<ref name="twsNPR12">{{Cite web |last=All Things Considered |date=May 23, 2012 |title=A New Look For The Hope Diamond |url=https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112116481 |access-date=March 28, 2016 |publisher=NPR |quote=...But Post says the tales of misery and mayhem just aren't true. ...Pierre Cartier, if he didn't completely make up the story, certainly embellished the story to get her interested...}}</ref><ref name="twsWashPost45">{{Cite news |last=Sarah Booth Conroy |date=September 29, 1997 |title=Hope & Despair: The 'Curse' of The Diamond |newspaper=Washington Post |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1997/09/29/hope-despair-the-curse-of-the-diamond/4775e88a-7423-4655-bd52-76890b9c2f94/ |access-date=March 28, 2016 |quote=...curse of the Hope Diamond was first given credence by Paris jeweler Pierre Cartier—or so the story goes—to entice Washingtonian Evalyn Walsh McLean into buying ...Legends whirl around it...}}</ref><ref name="twsLiveScienceXY">{{Cite web |last=Benjamin Radford |date=April 30, 2014 |title=Mystery of the Hope Diamond Curse |url=http://www.livescience.com/45239-hope-diamond-curse.html |access-date=March 28, 2016 |publisher=Live Science |quote=...}}</ref>

According to many specious accounts in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, the original form of the Hope Diamond was stolen from an eye of a sculpted statue of the [[Hindu goddess]] [[Sita]]. However, much like the "[[Curse of the Pharaohs#Tutankhamun's "curse"|curse of Tutankhamun]]", this general type of "legend" was most likely the independent creation of Western authors during the Victorian era,<ref>Keys, David. "[https://web.archive.org/web/20090423142118/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/curse-of-the-mummys-tomb-invented-by-victorian-writers-626787.html Curse of the mummy's tomb invented by Victorian writers]". ''[[The Independent]]''. December 31, 2000.</ref> and the specific legends about the Hope Diamond's "cursed origin" were invented in the early 20th century to add mystique to the stone and increase its sales appeal as well as increase newspaper sales.{{citation needed|date=November 2021}}

It fueled speculation that persons possessing the gemstone were fated to have bad luck with varying reports of undetermined veracity. A report in 2006 in ''[[The New York Times]]'', however, suggested that "any hard evidence linking it to tragedy has yet to be officially proven."<ref name="twsI36">{{Cite news |last=Jason Buchanan |date=2011 |title=Ancient Mysteries: Curse of the Hope Diamond (2006) (Title: Ancient Mysteries: Curse of the Hope Diamond – Running Time: 50 Minutes) |work=[[The New York Times]] |department=Movies & TV Dept. |url=https://movies.nytimes.com/movie/340355/Ancient-Mysteries-Curse-of-the-Hope-Diamond/overview |url-status=dead |access-date=July 9, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111119053656/http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/340355/Ancient-Mysteries-Curse-of-the-Hope-Diamond/overview |archive-date=November 19, 2011}}</ref>

There is evidence of several newspaper accounts which helped spread the "curse" story.<ref name="twsLiveScienceXY" /> A [[New Zealand]] newspaper article in 1888 described the supposedly lurid history of the Hope Diamond, including a claim that it was "said once to have formed the single eye of a great idol", as part of a confused description that also claimed that its namesake owner had personally "brought it from India", and that the diamond's true color was "white, [although] when held to the light, it emits the most superb and dazzling blue rays."<ref>{{Cite web |title=Papers Past – Hawke's Bay Herald – 25 April 1888 – Two Famous Diamonds |url=http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=HBH18880425.2.17 |access-date=October 11, 2010 |publisher=Paperspast.natlib.govt.nz}}</ref>

An article entitled "Hope Diamond Has Brought Trouble To All Who Have Owned It" appeared in ''[[The Washington Post]]'' in 1908.<ref>Richard Kurin, ''Hope Diamond: The Legendary History of a Cursed Gem'' (HarperCollins, 2006), p. 364; the article, drawn from the ''New York Herald'' and appeared on page 4 of the ''Post''s "Miscellany section"; the caption for the illustration was "Remarkable Jewel a Hoodoo".</ref> In 1909 upon reporting on the sale of the Hope Diamond [[The Times]] also gave an account of its history, noting "its possession is the story of a long series of tragedies - murder, suicide, madness, and various other misfortunes."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Luckhurst |first=Roger |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ybcMjWQwWOIC&q=%22sale+of+the+hope+diamond%22&pg=PA22 |title=The Mummy's Curse: The true history of a dark fantasy |date=2012 |publisher=OUP Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-164098-8 |pages=22 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=June 25, 1909 |title=Sale of the Hope Diamond. |pages=5 |work=The Times |issue=38995 |publication-place=London, England}}</ref>

These were followed by another ''New York Times'' article in 1911<ref name="twsI44bb" /> which gave a list of supposed cases of ill-fortune, but with few confirmations from other sources:
* Jacques Colet bought the Hope Diamond from Simon Frankel and committed suicide.
* Prince Ivan Kanitovski bought it from Colet but was killed by Russian revolutionaries.
* Kanitovski loaned it to Mlle Ladue who was "murdered by her sweetheart."
* Simon Mencharides, who had once sold it to the Turkish sultan, was thrown from a precipice along with his wife and young child.
* Sultan Hamid gave it to Abu Sabir to "polish" but later Sabir was imprisoned and tortured.
* Stone guardian Kulub Bey was hanged by a mob in Turkey.
* A Turkish attendant named Hehver Agha was hanged for having it in his possession.
* Tavernier, who brought the stone from [[India]] to Paris was "torn to pieces by wild dogs in Constantinople."
* King Louis XIV gave it to [[Madame de Montespan]] whom later he abandoned.
* [[Nicolas Fouquet|Nicholas Fouquet]], an "Intendant of France", borrowed it temporarily to wear it but was "disgraced and died in prison."
* A temporary wearer, [[Marie Thérèse Louise of Savoy, Princesse de Lamballe|Princess de Lamballe]], was "torn to pieces by a French mob."
* Jeweler William Fals who recut the stone "died a ruined man."
* William Fals' son Hendrik stole the jewel from his father and later died by [[suicide]].
* Some years (after Hendrik) "it was sold to Francis Deaulieu, who died in misery and want."

The mainstream view is that these accounts are specious and speculative since there are few, if any, independent confirmations to back them up.<ref name="twsLiveScienceXY" /> A few months later, perhaps compounded by inaccurate reports in ''[[The New York Times]]'' on November 17, 1909, it was incorrectly reported that the diamond's former owner, Selim Habib, had drowned in a shipwreck of the steamer ''Seyne'' near Singapore;<ref name="twsI43">{{Cite news |date=November 17, 1909 |title=Hope Diamond's Owner Lost; Famous Unlucky Stone also Said to Have Gone Down with the Seyne |work=The New York Times |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F70B15FB3D5412738DDDAE0994D9415B898CF1D3 |access-date=July 9, 2011}}</ref> in fact, it was a different person with the same name, not the owner of the diamond.<ref name="twsSmithsonian1">{{Cite magazine |title=The Misfortunes of Selim Habib |url=http://mineralsciences.si.edu/collections/hope/details/the-misfortunes-of-selim-habib.htm |magazine=Smithsonian |access-date=March 28, 2016 |quote=...on November 17, 1909, the New York Times reported that Habib had been killed in a shipwreck ... This report was wildly inaccurate. Neither Habib nor the Hope Diamond were on the steamer when it sank (although another man named Selim Habib did apparently drown in the shipwreck)...}}</ref> There was speculation that jeweler [[Pierre Cartier (jeweler)|Pierre Cartier]] further embroidered the lurid tales to intrigue Evalyn Walsh McLean into buying the Hope Diamond in 1911.<ref name="twsNPR12" />

The theme of greedy robbers stealing a valuable object from the tomb or shrine of an ancient god or ruler, and then being punished by it, is one which repeats in many different forms of literature. A likely source of inspiration for the fabrications was the [[Wilkie Collins]]' 1868 novel, ''[[The Moonstone]]'', which created a coherent narrative from vague and largely disregarded legends which had been attached to other diamonds such as the [[Koh-i-Noor]] and the [[Orloff diamond]]. The theme can be seen in films such as ''[[The Mummy (franchise)|The Mummy]]'' as well as stories about the curse of Egyptian king [[Tutankhamun]] and in more recent films such as the [[Indiana Jones]] films. In keeping with these scripts, according to the legend, Tavernier did not buy the Hope diamond but stole it from a [[Hindu]] temple where it had been set as one of two matching eyes of an idol, and the temple priests then laid a curse on whoever might possess the missing stone. Largely because the other blue diamond "eye" never surfaced, historians dismissed the fantastical story.<ref name="twsLiveScienceXY" />

The stories generally do not bear up to more pointed examination; for example, the legend that Tavernier's body was "torn apart by wolves"<ref name="twsI44bb" /> is inconsistent with historical evidence which shows that he lived to 84 and died of natural causes.{{citation needed|date=November 2021}}

It is possible that the overblown story of the "curse", possibly fueled by Cartier and others, may have caused some hesitation on the part of the prospective buyers, the McLeans, around 1911. When a lawsuit between buyer and seller erupted about the terms of the deal, newspapers kept alive reports of the diamond's "malevolent influence" with reports like this one, which blamed the stone's "curse" on having caused, of all things, the lawsuit itself:

{{blockquote|The malevolent influence that has for centuries dogged with discord and disaster the owners of the famous Hope diamond has started again and without waste of time, despite special precautions against ill-luck taken at the time of its last sale, according to John S. Wise, Jr., of 20 Broad Street, attorney for Cartiers, the Fifth Avenue jewelers, who are suing Mr. and Mrs. Edward B. McLean for $180,000, its alleged purchase price.|report in ''[[The New York Times]]'', March 1911<ref name="twsI44cc">{{Cite news |date=March 10, 1911 |title=Says M'Lean Drank Hope Diamond Toast; The Purchaser's Health Pledged, Jewelers' Lawyer Avers, When Famous Stone Was Delivered |work=The New York Times |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F30C12FF3F5517738DDDA90994DB405B818DF1D3 |access-date=2011-07-09}}</ref>}}

The Hope Diamond was also blamed for the unhappy fates of other historical figures vaguely linked to its ownership, such as the falls of Madame [[Athenais de Montespan]] and French finance minister, [[Nicolas Fouquet]], during the reign of [[Louis XIV of France]]; the beheadings of [[Louis XVI of France|Louis XVI]] and [[Marie Antoinette]] and the rape and mutilation of the [[Marie-Louise, princesse de Lamballe|Princesse de Lamballe]] during the [[French Revolution]]; and the forced abdication of Turkish Sultan [[Abdul Hamid II|Abdul Hamid]] who had supposedly killed various members of his court for the stone (despite the annotation in Habib's auction catalog).<ref name=twsI44bb/> Even jewelers who may have handled the Hope Diamond were not spared from its reputed malice: the insanity and suicide of Jacques Colot, who supposedly bought it from Eliason, and the financial ruin of the jeweler Simon Frankel, who bought it from the Hope family, were linked to the stone.<ref name=twsI44bb/> But although he is documented as a French diamond dealer of the correct era, Colot has no recorded connection with the stone, and Frankel's misfortunes were in the midst of economic straits that also ruined many of his peers.{{citation needed|date=November 2021}}

The legend includes deaths of numerous other characters who had been previously unknown: Diamond cutter Wilhelm Fals, killed by his son Hendrik, who stole it and later committed suicide; Francois Beaulieu, who received the stone from Hendrik but starved to death after selling it to Eliason; a Russian prince named Kanitowski, who lent it to French actress Lorens Ladue and promptly shot her dead on the stage, and was himself stabbed to death by revolutionaries; Simon Montharides, hurled over a precipice with his family.<ref name="twsI44bb" /> However, the existence of only a few of these characters has been verified historically, leading researchers to conclude that most of these persons are fictitious.{{citation needed|date=March 2016}}

The actress May Yohe made repeated attempts to capitalize on her identity as the former wife of the last Hope to own the diamond, and sometimes blamed the gemstone for her misfortunes. In July 1902, months after Lord Francis divorced her, she told police in [[Australia]] that her lover, Putnam Strong, had abandoned her and taken her jewels. In fact, the couple reconciled, married later that year, but divorced in 1910. On her third marriage in 1920, she persuaded film producer George Kleine to back a 15-episode serial ''[[The Hope Diamond Mystery]]'', which added fictitious characters to the tale, but the project was not successful. In 1921, she hired Henry Leyford Gates to help her write ''The Mystery of the Hope Diamond,'' in which she starred as Lady Francis Hope. The film added more characters, including a fictionalized Tavernier, and added [[Jean-Paul Marat|Marat]] among the diamond's "victims". She also wore her copy of the Hope, trying to generate more publicity to further her career.{{citation needed|date=November 2021}}

Evalyn Walsh McLean added her own narrative to the story behind the blue jewel, including that one of the owners had been [[Catherine the Great]], although there are no confirmations that the Russian ruler ever owned the diamond. McLean would bring the Diamond out for friends to try on, including [[Warren G. Harding]] and [[Florence Harding]].{{citation needed|date=November 2021}}

Since the Smithsonian acquired the gemstone, the "curse appears to have gone dormant."<ref name=twsI35/> Owning the diamond has brought "nothing but good luck" for the nonprofit national museum, according to a Smithsonian curator, and has helped it build a "world-class gem collection" with rising attendance levels.<ref name=twsI44ee/>

===Owners and their fates===
{| class="wikitable sortable"
|+ What happened to owners and wearers of the gem
!Date<br>acquired
!Owner
!Fate
!Notes
|-
|1653
|[[Jean-Baptiste Tavernier]]
|Lived 1605–1689; died age 84
|<ref name=twsI35/><ref name=twsI44bb/> Acquired between 1640 and 1667, possibly 1653<ref name=Kurin1/>
|-
|1668
|[[Louis XIV of France]]
|Long prosperous reign; lived 1638–1715, died age 76
|<ref name=twsI35/>
|-
|1722
||[[Louis XV of France]]
|Lived 1710–1774, died age 64
|
|-
|1775
|[[Louis XVI of France]]
|Guillotined in 1793, age 38
|<ref name=twsI44bb/>
|-
|1775
|[[Marie Antoinette]]
|Guillotined 1793, age 37
|<ref name=twsI44bb/> Wife of Louis XVI
|-
|1792<ref name=twsI44bb/>
|
|
|<ref name=twsI44bb/>
|-
|1805?
|King George IV of the United Kingdom
|Lived 1762–1830, died age 67
|Doubtful whether he ever owned it<ref name=twsI35/>
|-
|1812
|[[Daniel Eliason]], a London jeweler
|Died 17 November 1824, aged 71<ref>{{Cite news |last=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |date=22 November 1824 |title=Died |work=Evening Mail |location=England |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0001316/18241122/016/0004 |url-access=subscription |access-date=14 October 2022 |via=British Newspaper Archive}}</ref>
|<ref name=twsI44bb/>
|-
|1830
|[[Thomas Hope (1769–1831)|Thomas Hope]]
|Lived 1769–1831, died age 62
|<ref name=twsI44bb/>
|-
|1839
|Henry Philip Hope
|
|<ref name=twsI35/>
|-
|1861
|align="left"|[[Henry Pelham-Clinton, 6th Duke of Newcastle-under-Lyne|Henry Pelham-Clinton, 6th Duke of Newcastle]]
|Lived 1834–1879, died age 45
|<ref name=twsI44bb/>
|-
|1884
|[[Francis Pelham-Clinton-Hope, 8th Duke of Newcastle-under-Lyne|Lord Francis Hope]]
|Bankruptcy; forced to sell it; lived 1866–1941 died age 75
|<ref name=twsI44bb/><ref name=twsI44ff/>
|-
|1894
|[[May Yohé]]
|Musical actress, divorced, remarried several times, died poor, age 72
|<ref name=twsI44bb/> Wife of Lord Francis Hope
|-
|1901
|Adolph Weil, London jewel merchant
|
|
|-
|1901
|Simon Frankel
|
|
|-
|1908
|Selim Habib (Salomon? Habib)
|
|Possibly as agent for Turkish Sultan Hamid
|-
|1908
|Sultan [[Abdul Hamid II]] of Turkey
|Deposed 1909; died 1918, age 75
|Disputed whether the Sultan ever owned it
|-
|1909
|Simon Rosenau
|
|
|-
|1910
|[[Pierre Cartier (jeweler)|Pierre Cartier]]
|Lived 1878–1964, died age 86
|
|-
|1911
|[[Edward Beale McLean]] and<br>[[Evalyn Walsh McLean]]
|Couple divorced 1932;<br>Edward had mental illness and died aged 51 or 52;<br>Evalyn died aged 60 from pneumonia in 1947
|<ref name=twsI34/><ref name=twsI35/>
|-
|1947
|[[Harry Winston]]
|Lived 1896–1978, died age 83
|Jeweler who gave it to Smithsonian 1958<ref name=twsI34/>
|-
|1958
|[[Smithsonian Institution]]
|Prospered, attendance up
|<ref name=twsI34/><ref name=twsI35/>
|}