Imperial Family of Japan Jewellery 1: Ending 2023

[Josefine]

picture from http://alloverpress.dk/fotoweb/

 

[Josefine]

picture from http://alloverpress.dk/fotoweb/

 

[Josefine]

picture from http://alloverpress.dk/fotoweb/

 

[Josefine]

www.polfoto.dk

 

[Josefine]

Can someone help me to tell about her jewelry, what kind of jewelry boxes does she got…does she wear jewelry often?

 

[Josefine]

does anyone know how many tiaras she got

 

[mybags]

Princess Sayako Jewelry

Princess Sayako

 

[Eliza]

does anyone know if she gets to keep her Jewelry after her marriage...cos she becomes a commoner after her marriage right?

 

[Warren]

does anyone know how many tiaras she got

No responses. Isn't anyone from the Imperial Household Agency logged on?

Those who know don't tell.

For an Imperial House I imagine there would be a treasure-trove of fabulous jewels lying in the vaults.

Shame we only get to see a fraction of it.
.

 

[Mia]

You can always try first from the Royal Jewels of The World site or Royal Splendour... Most of the tiaras are listed there.

Here is for example the Japanese section of Royal Splendour:
http://nl.msnusers.com/RoyaltyDanjel2/japindexw.msnw

The large tiara Empress Michiko wears in the picture is the Imperial Chrysanthemum tiara. The 16-petalled chrysanthemums are the emblems of the Imperial House of Japan.

I haven't seen so many pictures of the jewelry of the Imperial House of Japan. It might be even so that they don't have very much jewelry. This because in Japan it has been a tradition that women wearing kimonos wear jewelry only in their hair.

Most of the Imperial jewelry look very modern.

 

[Warren]

Yes, the large Chrysanthemum tiara is quite spectacular, and the tiara that Crown Princess Masako wore after her wedding is rather grand.

I was speculating... Japan was (is) an Empire; after 1868 and modernisation more Western habits were taken up; Burma and northern Thailand are renowned for their gems; most of the South East Asian countries were monarchies and there were probably gifts of gems between the various Royal and Imperial Houses; on Danjel's site (I think) Empress Sadako (Hirohito's mother) is pictured wearing some some classy diamonds, that would be early last century.

Dynasties by their nature tend to accumulate precious things, if only for family prestige (let alone easily transportable asset wealth).

I guess part of the mystique of Royal Jewellery is that we never really know... who has what, what's in the vaults, what the provenance of a particular piece is.

I was struck by the fact that Josephine's post in Oct 2004 had produced no responses.

Again, generally those who know tend not to tell.

In "The Royal Jewels" by Suzy Menkes she remarks that her efforts to trace the whereabouts of some of Queen Alexandra's Indian gems were

"actively discouraged, apparently by instructions from Buckingham Palace... The trickle and stream and torrent and flood of presents that have been given to the Queen [Elizabeth] is a subject that is totally taboo".

There are plenty of jewels in museums, but that's not very interesting.
We want to see them worn by Empresses, Queens, Princesses, Archduchesses, Sultans and Sultanas.

We want to know where they came from, and we want to know what else they have.
Not to know how wealthy they are, but because they are beautiful things, and some of them are works of art in their own right.

And they are not going to tell us!

 

[Mia]

Yes, Warren, you are absolutely right. Thats, how it works. Somehow talking jewelry is not considered proper by the royals, but then again they don't usually mind showing their art collection, paintings, sculpture etc. That is considered OK. I guess it depends partly on the fact that there are today so many people critisizing the royal houses of spending too much money on luxury items etc.

I kind of enjoy the fact that everything is not revealed. Then there are plenty of chances to speculate and dream...

 

[Elspeth]

I read somewhere that the Japanese royal family doesn't have that many jewels these days. It sounds as though their collection might have been pruned by the Allies after the war. I have no idea how authoritative that source is, though.

 

[msfroyste]

i read a few months back that due to the "denoblization" of the many members of the imperial family after wwII, a lot of the jewels were split up amongst the many members of the family, namily b/c of the fact that they were no longer royals but had become commoners. the article that i read stated that vast amounts of jewelery were sold off just so they could survive as most of them didn't have "normal" skills and abilities that could bring in much of an income, which is very sad.

 

[Warren]

I read somewhere that the Japanese royal family doesn't have that many jewels these days. It sounds as though their collection might have been pruned by the Allies after the war. I have no idea how authoritative that source is, though.

Elspeth
All I could find was this quote from "Hirohito Emperor of Japan" by Leonard Mosley, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1966:

"All his properties, at SCAP's [Supreme Commander Allied Powers] request were taken over by the State and his personal fortune, estimated at US$100,000,000 in 1945, sequestered."

Nothing about jewels, treasures, heirlooms etc.

But even if the confiscation did include these things, you would imagine that later Japanese governments would have returned them.

Another mystery!

W

 

[Elspeth]

Yep, a mystery indeed. I gather that the royal ladies don't appear in a great variety of heirloom jewels - either they don't exist or the ladies are being very discreet.

 

[Warren]

Chrysanthemum Tiara (& Bonus)

A good picture of the Empress, with the Duchess of Gloucester as an added bonus for tiara-watchers...

 

[Josefine]

from the state visit to norway

 

[Josefine]

does she have any more jewllery?

 

[MoonlightRhapsody]

does anyone know if she gets to keep her Jewelry after her marriage...cos she becomes a commoner after her marriage right?

I doubt it'll make a difference. If her jewelries are her own personal property, then she keeps them. If she uses jewelry from the royal jewels, then I guess she loses the right to use those.

I think that's so sad that female members of the Japanese Royal Family lose their royal status when they get married. It's not just a title they're being stripped of, it's also the only way of life they've ever been exposed to for the most part.

 

[Warren]

Japanese Mystery!

does she have any more jewellery?

We've discussed in another thread how difficult it is to determine what jewellery (especially tiaras) the Imperial Family has; it would be near-impossible to know what Princess Sayako [I still prefer her "old" name of Princess Nori] owns independently.

Unless of course someone from the Imperial Household Agency is reading this, and would care to tell us!
.

 

[Warren]

From the visit of the King of Morocco, Nov 2005.
The Empress is wearing one of her more spectacular diamond tiaras, a large brooch, and a lesser necklace.

http://www.theroyalforums.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=217416&d=1133199374

Originally posted by fanletizia

 

[Josefine]

as she is now married to a commener do yo think we will see her in tiara in the future

 

[MoonlightRhapsody]

as she is now married to a commener do yo think we will see her in tiara in the future

I highly doubt it. Now that she's a commoner, with respects to royal duties, she's going to be treated as if she was never a part of the royal family, like she was born a commoner. Privately, she would still be the daughter of the Emperor and Empress plus the sister of the Crown Prince and Prince Akishino.

 

[galuhcandrakirana]

In this picture we can see the empress's diamonds bracellet http://img152.imagevenue.com/img.php?loc=loc66&image=11288_NWS_1050867.jpg

 

[Mark Onehi]

You wud think with the history of the Japanese Imperial history that there wud be more royal jewels funny that

 

[bluebess]

How come they only wear diamonds for galas? I love diamonds but they get boring to look at imo, like someone wearing white all the time. I would like to see them wear some colored gems. Maybe there is a protocol restriction regarding the wearing of something other than white gems? Like the British royal family wearing only white jewels during the mourning period.

 

[Prince of Chota]

You wud think with the history of the Japanese Imperial history that there wud be more royal jewels funny that

Well, one has to remember that this is Japan, not Europe, so the traditions of self-decoration are substantially different. There were no royal jewels (in the European sense of tiaras and the like) until the Meiji period (1867-1912). There was an explosion of Japanese jewellery during this period, however, and to this day Japan has a very sophisticated jewel culture (Mikimoto, for example, is one of these original 19th century firms). During the second world war, though, much of Japan's cities were destroyed, and this includes the artwork, residences, and jewels of the imperial and noble families. Again, though, it is most important to remember that in the 2,666 years of the Yamato clan's rule, only the last 140 or so have included the "royal forums' style" jewels.

 

[Tzu An]

You can always try first from the Royal Jewels of The World site or Royal Splendour...

It's strange, the photos are not loading on my computer.

 

[Warren]

Disappearing pics and copyright

It's strange, the photos are not loading on my computer.

They won't, because they are no longer there.

Danjel's site and the "Royal Jewels of the World" site are the prime examples of what can happen when a website uses photographs without acknowledging the copyright holders: the photo agencies demand removal of their pics and the site is effectively shut down. Be warned.