Colombian Army Releases Video of Treasure Strewn From San José Shipwreck

The Colombian army just released fascinating underwater footage of treasure strewn from the wreckage of the San José galleon — a warship sunk by the British Royal Navy in 1708.

Considered to be one of the richest treasure ships ever lost in the Western Hemisphere, the Spanish flagship had been carrying more than 200 tons of valuables, including high-purity gold doubloons, silver coins and chests filled with emeralds. The bounty is estimated to be worth up to $17 billion.

The San José languished on the ocean floor at a depth of nearly 1 kilometer (3,280 feet) for more than 300 years. The Colombian navy formally announced the ship's discovery in 2015 near the port of Cartagena on Colombia's coast. Its exact location is considered a state secret.

For many years, a number of entities have claimed ownership of the treasure, including Colombia, Spain, the Qhara Qhara nation of indigenous Bolivians and a professional salvage company.

According to the BBC, Spain had claimed the San José as a "ship of state" as it was under the country's control when it was sunk. The indigenous Bolivians claimed the ill-gotten Spanish treasure was extracted from the wealth its people. The salvage company, Sea Search Armada, claimed to have found the San José wreckage in the early 1980s.

Built in 1699, the 127-foot-long, three-masted galleon had been escorting 11 merchant ships when it was attacked by a British fleet and exploded during the battle. Of the 600 people aboard, only 11 survived.

The video of the shipwreck taken by a submersible vehicle was shared by Colombian Minister of Defense Diego Molano Aponte. In the video, we can clearly see valuable items, such as gold coins, pottery and Chinese porcelain teacups, scattered across the ocean floor near the wreckage.

Colombian President Ivan Duque praised his country's navy for capturing "images with a level of precision that's never been seen before" and has vowed that the treasure from the wreck would remain in Colombia.

It's expected that valuables from the wreck will be exhibited in a museum to be built in Cartagena.

In an unexpected twist, while studying the site of the San José, the Colombian navy's submersible vehicle also spotted two new shipwrecks — one of a colonial boat and another of a schooner that dates back to Colombia's war for independence from Spain in 1819. Colombian officials have yet to offer details about what either ship might have been transporting.

Credits: Screen grabs via Twitter.com / Diego_Molano.

It’s Best to Wear Your Precious Jewelry Through Airport Security, Says TSA

With summer vacations right around the corner, we have fresh information and expert advice on the best way to take your precious jewelry possessions through airport security.

In most cases, it’s perfectly OK to wear your fine jewelry through the checkpoint station instead of removing it, according to the U.S. Transportation Security Administration (TSA). Your fine jewelry should NEVER be packed into your checked luggage.

As long as the jewelry is not really bulky, you should keep your jewelry on your body as you walk through metal detectors or imaging devices.

Chances are the jewelry won’t alarm, and if it does you can let an officer inspect it with you there.

If you are traveling with very valuable items, you can ask the TSA officer to screen you and your jewelry in private to maintain your security.

"In general, jewelry doesn’t need to be removed before going through security," wrote the TSA on its Twitter page called @AskTSA. "However, we recommend putting on heavy jewelry after you go through security, to reduce the likelihood of an alarm that results in a pat-down screening."

In that case, the heavy jewelry should be placed in a carry-on bag and then put on after the screening process.

Additional items should be stored in the carry-on bag because it stays with you throughout your air travel journey. It's additionally useful to keep your jewelry untangled and organized in a travel jewelry case. These handy travel companions usually have a zipped enclosure with dedicated space for earrings, necklaces, rings and bracelets.

Avoid putting fine jewelry in the plastic bowls that typically hold smaller items, such as pocket change and money clips. Bowls can easily flip over on the conveyor belt.

IMPORTANT: Under no circumstances should you pack your fine jewelry in checked luggage. Here’s real-life example of how doing so can turn out very, very badly…

Back in 2006, the Duchess of Argyll was returning to Glasgow, Scotland, after a short stay in London. The 68-year-old dowager duchess had checked a bag containing more than $150,000 worth of jewelry, including a Victorian diamond tiara, Cartier brooch, emerald ring and pearl earrings.

Yes, the bag was lost.

The Duchess filed a complaint with the airport and police authorities, but the bag was never turned in… or at least that’s what the Duchess believed.

In fact, the bag did resurface, but the airport authorities auctioned the jewelry instead of making any effort to return the items to their rightful owner. A British diamond merchant claimed the lot for a mere $7,500 (exactly 5% of their value) and the proceeds were donated by the airport to charity.

In 2012, the Duchess spotted her Cartier brooch in a Scottish auction catalog and promptly hired a lawyer to investigate. Airport authorities were embarrassed by a lost-luggage saga with high-profile implications.

After offering to reimburse the diamond merchant for his cooperation, operators of Glasgow Airport successfully reunited the Duchess with her brooch and tiara. Sadly, she would never see her emerald ring or pearl earrings again. A hard lesson learned.

Credit: Image by Bigstockphoto.com.

World's Most Celebrated Natural Pearl Almost Ended Up in the Belly of a Beast

In 1513, an African slave discovered a perfectly symmetrical, pear-shaped, 55.95-carat natural pearl in the waters off the coast of Panama, and for the next 500+ years the treasure would wind its way through the royal boudoirs of Spain, England, France and Austria, earning it the Spanish name "La Peregrina," or "The Pilgrim."

Today, La Peregrina is arguably the most celebrated natural pearl of all time and one of the finest examples of June's official birthstone.

Throughout its history, the pearl has been cherished and protected, albeit with a few exceptions. Legend has it that the pearl was once lost and then found between the cushions of a sofa at Windsor Castle. In a second instance, the pearl disappeared during a wedding reception at Buckingham Palace, only to be spotted a little later hitching a ride on the bride's train.

But La Peregrina was nearly lost forever under the stewardship of actress Elizabeth Taylor.

In 1969, Richard Burton spent $37,000 (outbidding a prince at Sotheby’s) to buy La Peregrina for his wife, Taylor, as a gift for Valentine’s Day. In a Caesars Palace suite, Taylor had been wearing the famous pearl on a delicate pearl-and-diamond chain, but then realized it was gone.

In her book, My Love Affair with Jewelry, Taylor shared a moment-by-moment account of what happened next.

"I glanced over at Richard and thank God he wasn't looking at me, and I went into the bedroom and threw myself on the bed, buried my head into the pillow and screamed," Taylor recalled. "Very slowly and very carefully, I retraced all my steps in the bedroom. I took my slippers off, took my socks off, and got down on my hands and knees, looking everywhere for the pearl. Nothing. I thought, 'It's got to be in the living room in front of Richard. What am I going to do. He'll kill me!' Because he loved the piece."

Then Taylor noticed one of her puppies munching on something.

"I just casually opened the puppy's mouth and inside his mouth was the most perfect pearl in the world," she wrote. "It was — thank God— not scratched."

Shortly thereafter, Taylor commissioned Cartier to reset La Peregrina with pearls, diamonds and rubies in a majestic necklace that was to resemble the jewelry worn by Mary, Queen of Scots, in a famous portrait. The pearl’s original setting can be seen in Taylor’s cameo in Anne of the Thousand Days (1969). The new, more exquisite, setting makes brief cameos in the films Divorce His — Divorce Hers (1973) and A Little Night Music (1977).

In 2005, La Peregrina was one of 12 rare pearls featured during a six-month exhibition called “The Allure of Pearls” at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC.

Taylor passed away in March of 2011 at the age of 79. Later that same year, La Peregrina headlined a high-profile auction of Taylor's jewelry at Christie's New York, with a portion of the proceeds benefiting the The Elizabeth Taylor Aids Foundation.

Christie's had set the pre-sale estimate for La Peregrina at $2 million to $3 million, but enthusiastic bidding for the historic piece drove the final price to $11.8 million.

Natural pearls, such as La Peregrina, are exceedingly rare because they are created by mollusks randomly, without human intervention. When a grain of sand or similar irritant gets between the mollusk’s shell and its mantle tissue, the process begins.

To protect itself, the mollusk instinctually secretes multiple layers of nacre, an iridescent material that eventually becomes a pearl. Cultured pearls, by contrast, are created when a bead is embedded inside the body of the mollusk to stimulate nacre secretion.

Credits: Images courtesy of Christies.

This Cabochon-Cut Black Diamond Masquerades as a Tahitian Pearl

The Smithsonian's National Gem Collection in Washington, DC, features an unusual cabochon-cut black diamond that masquerades as a Tahitian pearl.

Named the "Winston Adamantine Pearl," the 44-carat domed diamond presents the lustrous beauty of a pearl while maintaining the unique properties of a diamond.

The adjective "adamantine" is derived from "adamas," the Ancient Greek word for diamond. An item that mimics the hardness or scintillating nature of a diamond may be described as adamantine.

Cut from a rough diamond that was approximately 150 carats in size, the Winston Adamantine Pearl is bezel set in a platinum pendant that resembles a spiderweb. Fifty-two baguette and round brilliant-cut diamonds adorn the interlocking web and outer rim of the pendant.

While it's common to find opal, turquoise, onyx, moonstone and star sapphires cut with a highly polished rounded top, diamonds are almost exclusively faceted to show off that particular gem's unmatched refractive properties.

Black diamonds owe their color to numerous dark inclusions, such as graphite, pyrite or hematite, that extend throughout the stone, according to the Gemological Institute of America. Their opaqueness is caused by a “polycrystalline” structure that inhibits the reflection of light.

This is likely why the luxury jeweler Harry Winston decided to go with the cabochon cut.

Harry Winston donated the pendant to the Smithsonian in 1997 during the dedication of the Harry Winston Gallery, one of eight exhibit areas in the then-renovated Janet Annenberg Hooker Hall of Geology, Gems and Minerals at the National Museum of Natural History.

While the Winston Adamantine Pearl and a Tahitian pearl may look very similar, their hardnesses vary widely, with the diamond rating a perfect 10 on the Mohs scale and the pearl occupying the lower end of the spectrum with a Mohs rating of 2.5 – 4.5.

Known for their large sizes (8mm to 18mm) and rich iridescent colors that can include black, grey and brown with overtones of blue, green, purple or pink, the highly coveted Tahitian cultured pearls are cultivated in the waters of French Polynesia.

Pearl is the official gemstone for the month of June, while diamond is the official gemstone for the month of April.

Credit: Photo by Ken Larsen / Smithsonian.