The Famous Florentine Diamond Has Been Found After More Than a Century — Thanks to the Unveiling of a Major Family Secret

The famous Florentine Diamond — missing for more than a hundred years — has finally been found.

The 137-carat, pear-cut gem, known for its distinctive yellow hue, was once adorned by European royalty for generations. Long thought to have vanished around 1918, the diamond has now been located in a secure bank vault in Canada, according to a report from The New York Times.

Currently owned by descendants of the Austro-Hungarian royal family, the diamond’s existence has been a closely guarded family secret. Its current holders have at last come forward to reveal how the extraordinary jewel survived the upheaval of Europe’s wars and political collapse.

The diamond’s last known custodians were Charles I, the final emperor of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and his wife, Empress Zita. As World War I drew to a close, the royal couple fled Austria with their children, and for decades the Florentine Diamond was presumed lost. After Charles I’s death in 1922, Zita and her family eventually relocated to Canada to escape the Nazis during World War II.

For years, theories swirled about the gem’s fate — from claims that the exiled royals sold it to an anonymous buyer for survival funds, to rumors that it had been gifted to a loyal servant who carried it to South America.

However, Karl von Habsburg-Lothringen, the couple’s grandson, clarified that his grandmother personally brought the diamond — along with several other family jewels — across continents in a simple cardboard suitcase. He believes she placed them in a Canadian bank vault upon arrival and simply left them there.

“And in that bank safe, it just stayed,” he said, adding that Empress Zita revealed the diamond’s location only to her sons Robert and Rodolphe. She reportedly instructed them to keep the jewel’s whereabouts secret for a century following her husband’s death.

“The less people know about it, the bigger the security,” von Habsburg-Lothringen explained.

The diamond’s authenticity has now been verified by Austria’s former imperial court jeweler, Christoph Köchert, who examined the piece in detail.

“Its cut pattern corresponds almost exactly to representations in historical sources,” he noted in a statement to The New York Times. “All of this gives me certainty that this is the genuine, historical Florentine Diamond.”

As for the future of the rediscovered treasure, Charles and Zita’s grandchildren — who currently live in Europe — have expressed their wish to exhibit the diamond and other hidden heirlooms in Canada, as a tribute to the country that sheltered their family during times of turmoil.

“It should be part of a trust here in Canada,” von Habsburg-Lothringen said. “It should be on exhibition in Canada sometimes, so that people can actually see those pieces.”