![]() The 96 smaller stones were given to the Asschers as their fee for cutting the diamond. In 1910, after King Edward's death, King George V had the Cullinan I and Cullinan II set in the sovereign's sceptre and Imperial State Crown respectively. Pic: APĬullinan I became known as the Star of Africa and Cullinan II became known as The Lesser Star of Africa. The stone was carefully sent off to England and to keep it safe, detectives from London were asked to send out replicas and decoys in public to throw off potential thieves.Īfter the Anglo-Boer War, the South African Transvaal government bought the diamond from Cullinan and later presented and gifted it to Britain's King Edward VII in 1907. ![]() The Cullinan diamond was only a fragment of an even bigger stone that was still not yet discovered - it weighed 3,106 carats (621.2 grams). He continued to grow in his career and in 1910, Cullinan was knighted for his work in the diamond industry.Īccording to the Cape Town Diamond Museum, the diamond was first discovered at the Premier Mine in Pretoria, South Africa, by Fedrick Wells in 1905. ![]() In 1897, Cullinan moved to Parktown, where he discovered the Premier diamond fields a year later.Ĭullinan soon became the co-founder of what came to be The Transvaal Chamber of Industries - a mining-industry employer organisation. ![]()
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