Bucking tradition, a giddy Diana got to choose the stones and setting from Garrard & Co.. “A briefcase comes along on the pretext that [Prince] Andrew is getting a signet ring for his 21st birthday and along come these sapphires,” Diana recalled, per Morton. “I mean nuggets! I suppose I chose it, we all chipped in.”
In a move that surprised the queen, Diana chose the largest stone presented, a 12-carat oval blue Ceylon sapphire surrounded by a halo of diamonds. The 18-carat setting was simply picked from a catalogue—a scandal for the time. While anyone with $37,000 could have the same ring, it did at least have royal pedigree. The design was based on a sapphire-and-diamond brooch Prince Albert had made for his wedding to Queen Victoria in 1840.
Although she would later consider the ring too old-fashioned, a young Diana reveled in showing it off. At one dinner party, it became a topic of conversation, and Diana let an admirer try it on. “I’ll have to have it back, though,’ she quipped. ‘Otherwise they won’t know who I am,’” Kitty Kelley recounts in The Royals. “The woman gazed at the ring on her finger. ‘Oh,’ she exclaimed. ‘It’s beautiful. I’ve never seen such a large stone.’ ‘I know,’ said Diana. ‘The other day I even scratched my nose with it. It’s so big—the ring, that is.’”
A (Very) Brief History of Royal Engagement Rings
Ever since ancient times, rings, made with everything from copper to bone, have been worn to signify betrothal or devotion. According to Brides magazine, in 850 CE, Pope Nicholas I declared the gift of a ring signified a man’s intention to marry the recipient.
Legend has it that Archduke Maximilian of Austria was the first royal to propose with a diamond engagement ring. Allegedly, Maximilian proposed to Mary of Burgundy in 1477 with a diamond ring shaped like the letter “M.” Supporting this theory is the existence of a similar ring in the Museum of Fine Arts in Vienna.
But engagement rings were not popular in royal circles until the mid-19th century. Royal marriages were brokered through ambassadors and diplomats and were business arrangements, not intimate love matches. There were no proposals. Royal brides usually received royal parures, suites of fine jewelry as forms of payment. When Marie Antoinette was betrothed to the future King Louis XVI in 1770, she was given a suite of jewelry in a diamond-bow motif.