Chalk Emerald

{{Short description|Large Colombian emerald}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=March 2025}}

{{Use Indian English|date=June 2018}}

File:Chalk emerald.jpg

The Chalk Emerald is a {{convert|37.82|carat|g}} rectangular step-cut emerald, mined in Muzo, Colombia. It was one of many Colombian emeralds shipped to India by the Spanish in the 16th and 17th centuries. Ownership of the stone after its arrival is unrecorded until its sale by Jagaddipendra Narayan, the Maharaja of Koch Bihar, to a British gem broker in 1959. Jagaddipendra stated that the stone was formerly the centerpiece of an emerald and diamond necklace worn by his mother, Indira Devi, to various state functions.{{Cite book |last=Post |first=Jeffrey Edward |title=The Smithsonian National Gem Collection-unearthed: surprising stories behind the jewels |date=2021 |publisher=Abrams Books |isbn=978-1-4197-4580-5 |location=New York}}

The emerald was purchased by the American jeweler Harry Winston, who recut it from its original weight of {{convert|38.40|carat|g}}, and added a gold setting to attach it to a platinum ring of his own design. Surrounding the Chalk Emerald itself are sixty pear-shaped diamonds, totalling {{convert|15.62|carat|g}}. The ring was sold in 1962 to Oscar Roy Chalk—an entrepreneur from New York for whom the emerald is now named—for his wife Clair to wear to a state dinner at the White House in honor of Queen Elizabeth II. Supposedly, she turned the ring around during the event so as to not upstage the less-impressive emerald ring worn by the Queen.Donnelly, Shannon, "[https://web.archive.org/web/20060711144321/http://www.palmbeachdailynews.com/comm/content/news/chalkobit514.html Chalk Emerald owner dies at 95]", Palm Beach Daily News, 14 May 2006. Retrieved 29 December 2022 via Internet Archive.

The Chalks donated the ring to the Smithsonian Institution in 1972, and it is now part of the Smithsonian's National Gem and Mineral Collection on display in the National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C.Smithsonian Institution, [https://naturalhistory.si.edu/explore/collections/geogallery/10002694 Chalk Emerald], National Museum of Natural History website, retrieved 29 December 2022.

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