The Coleridge Collar is a

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile ...

necklace whose

provenance Provenance (from the French ''provenir'', 'to come from/forth') is the chronology of the ownership, custody or location of a historical object. The term was originally mostly used in relation to works of art but is now used in similar senses i ...

is disputed. It is said to be either a 16th-century

chain of office A livery collar or chain of office is a collar or heavy chain, usually of gold, worn as insignia of office or a mark of fealty or other association in Europe from the Middle Ages onwards. One of the oldest and best-known livery collars is the Co ...

, given by

King Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is best known for his six marriages, and for his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. His disagr ...

to his adviser Sir Edward Montagu, on the latter's appointment as

Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas The chief justice of the Common Pleas was the head of the Court of Common Pleas, also known as the Common Bench or Common Place, which was the second-highest common law court in the English legal system until 1875, when it, along with the other ...

in 1546; or a 17th-century copy. A former owner,

William Coleridge, 5th Baron Coleridge William Duke Coleridge, 5th Baron Coleridge Deputy Lieutenant, DL (born 18 June 1937) is an hereditary peer who lives in Ottery St Mary in Devon, England. Biography The son of Richard Duke Coleridge, 4th Baron Coleridge, Richard Duke Coleridge, t ...

, was advised by

Sotheby's Sotheby's () is a British-founded American multinational corporation with headquarters in New York City. It is one of the world's largest brokers of fine and decorative art, jewellery, and collectibles. It has 80 locations in 40 countries, an ...

that the collar was a 22- carat copy, and so sold it privately, in 2006, for £35,000. However, on 6 November 2008 the purchaser resold it, as a 20-carat original, for more than £300,000, via Sotheby's rival

Christie's Christie's is a British auction house founded in 1766 by James Christie. Its main premises are on King Street, St James's in London, at Rockefeller Center in New York City and at Alexandra House in Hong Kong. It is owned by Groupe Artémis, t ...

. In 2012, Lord Coleridge sued Sotheby's, at the High Court, London, for the difference. Lord Coleridge lost the case and had to pay some 90% of the costs, about £1 million.

References

Chains Gold Individual necklaces {{Clothing-stub