Crown of the Andes

In 1963 it was sold at an auction at Sotheby in London to the Dutch diamond company Asscher, acting for an anonymous buyer.

According to the conventional account, it was made in the 1590s in gratitude for the city of Popayán after being spared an outbreak of smallpox which was devastating the region.

However, Christopher Hartop is a jewellery expert who examined the crown during a proposed sale at Christie's in New York in 1995, and he suggested that it was a composite piece.

Permission was given in 1914, but the sellers did not find a buyer until 1936 when an American syndicate purchased it, led by Chicago businessman Warren J. Piper.

It was acquired and exported legally, but it was made in Popayán from local gold and emeralds and used there continually in religious worship for three centuries, and the Instituto Distrital de Cultura y Turismo of Colombia has suggested that it should be returned to the region where it has the most cultural significance.