Today marks the 140th Anniversary of the Birth of Princess Helen of Serbia, Princess Elena Petrovna of Russia, who was born on this day in 1884! The daughter of the first Yugoslavia King and niece of the Italian Queen, who married a Russian Prince that was assassinated during the Russian Revolution, Princess Helen possessed this striking heirloom Diamond Flower Tiara!

But first, let’s learn about Princess Helen! The daughter of King Peter I of Serbia and Princess Ljubica of Montenegro, she was the niece of Queen Elena of Italy, two Grand Duchesses of Russia and the last Princess of Battenberg, and was educated in Russia at the Smolny Institute in St. Petersburg, while her father being the King of Serbia in 1903, and later the first King of Yugoslavia in 1918. In 1911, Princess Helen married Prince John Konstantinovich of Russia, son of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich and Princess Elisabeth of Saxe-Altenburg and a great-grandson of Emperor Nicholas I of Russia. Princess Elena Petrovna studied medicine at the Saint Petersburg Imperial University, which she had to give up following the birth of her children, but as an HRH, she had the right to receive diplomats in her own right, unlike her husband, who was only a HH. By the time of the Russian Revolution, they were living in a wing of the Pavlovsk Palace along with her husband’s aunt, Queen Olga of Greece. The couple had two children, Prince Vsevolod Ivanovich and Princess Catherine Ivanovna, who she left with her mother-in-law while following Prince John into his exile in Siberia, where he was executed by the Bolsheviks in 1918, while the Princess was imprisoned at Perm and then at the Kremlin before joining her children in Sweden.  Returning to Yugoslavia, she was not close to her brother King Alexander I, and eventually settled in Nice, where she passed away in 1962.

The exact origin of this tiara is unknown but it appears to have been an heirloom of Princess Zorka Karađorđević, born Princess Ljubica of Montenegro, the mother of Princess Helen, who appears to have worn the Diamond Flower Tiara in a portrait before her untimely death in 1890, long before her husband became the first King of Yugoslavia.

A very similar Diamond Flower Necklace was also worn by the ill-fated Queen Draga Obrenović, who was assassinated alongside her husband, King Alexander I, in a coup that brought King Peter to the Serbian Throne.

When Princess Helen married Prince John Konstantinovich of Russia, a great-grandson of Emperor Nicholas I of Russia, in 1911, she seems to have received this Diamond Flower Tiara as a Wedding Gift, which she wore for a series of portraits soon after her Wedding.

The ultimate fate of the Tiara is unknown, because even if it escaped with Princess Helen from Russia, it may have been sold during years of exile. The Tiara was not worn by her daughter-in-law, Lady Mary Lygon, Princess Romanovsky-Pavlovsky, but it may have been worn when her daughter, Princess Catherine Ivanovna, married the Marquess Farace di Villaforesta, in 1937. It’s current location is unknown.

Ivy Wreath Tiara

Queen Elena’s Emerald Tiara

Queen Margherita’s Musy Tiara