Perhaps the most sensational story told about Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton is one that happens to be true. Yes, he did give her one of the World’s largest and most beautiful diamonds, appropriately named the Taylor-Burton. If any gem could be noticed next to the beauty of Elizabeth Taylor it was this 69-carat, pear-shaped diamond. The stone was unearthed at the Premier mine of South Africa in 1966. And it was Harry Winston who cut and polished the rough stone from its original size of 244-carats.
When the gem went up for auction in 1969 it was Cartier who first obtained it. The very next day Richard Burton purchased the diamond, for an undisclosed sum of money, to give to his wife, Elizabeth Taylor. Although Ms. Taylor is known for her love for diamonds, she put the Taylor-Burton up for auction 10 years later. The proceeds from the sale went to fund a hospital in Botswana.
The last recorded sale of the Taylor-Burton was in 1979 for nearly $3,000,000 to an anonymous buyer in Saudi Arabia.
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