(female narrator) The Royal Family owns the most illustrious and captivating jewelry collection in the world.

(regal music) But what secrets lie beneath these precious stones in the royal regalia?

(woman) The value of the royal jewels has been estimated anything up to about £5 billion.

(female narrator) In this program, we shine a light on the most famous collection in the world: the Crown Jewels.

These are the big boys.

(woman) Big diamond tiaras.

Socking great rings.

(woman) And they literally bedazzle.

(female narrator) We uncover the jewelry secrets of the People's Princess... ♪ (woman) The ring's become known in royal circles as "the divorce ring."

(woman) Anything that's to do with Princess Diana becomes priceless because of the Greek tragedy surrounding her life.

(female narrator) ...the politics behind Kate's favorite tiara...

There is a pecking order in the Royal Family.

It is all about hierarchy.

(female narrator) ...the gossip behind Meghan Markle's sparkle... (woman) Harry exploded in rage and said, "What Meghan wants, Meghan gets," and the Queen responded, "No, she doesn't."

(female narrator) ...and how every jewel has a tale to tell.

(woman) The jewels were buried in a biscuit tin beneath the grounds of Windsor Castle.

(woman) There was a plane crash, but the tiara survives.

(female narrator) These are the secrets of the royal jewels.

♪ As custodian of the royal jewels, the Queen gets to wear and lend to her family some of the most exquisite tiaras, necklaces, brooches, and rings in the world.

But imagine being able to dip into the biggest and most beautiful gems which make up Her Royal Highness's peerless Crown Jewels.

23,578 precious stones set in more than 140 pieces.

These are the big boys.

These are the Crown Jewels in the Tower of London.

The orb, the scepter, the sword, the crown.

They are the monarch.

(Clare) Some of the most famous, important, and valuable gemstones and diamonds on the planet.

(Thomas) This is the regalia that symbolize the monarchy going back 800 years.

(soft music) (Clare) The Crown Jewels represent the multiple roles that our monarch has, not only as head of state but head of the armed forces and head of the Church of England as well.

♪ Well, the reason for wearing jewelry for anybody at any point in history, whether it's a ring through your nose or a crown on your head, is to decorate yourself.

And when you are a king or a queen, you need the biggest, the shiniest, the best peacock feathers.

(female narrator) For the British royals, their peacock feathers are no mere adornment.

From the stones to the settings, all royal jewels have significance and meaning.

(Susie) Royal jewels represent any kind of history you want them to and almost every kind of history there's been.

(Ingrid) Marriage and treason and beheading, and love... (Susie) ...war, bribery, corruption, sex, death.

It's all there.

(Ingrid) They were usually given to someone in a moment of great passion or great love or just shimmying up to them, making them like you.

(wistful music) ♪ (playful music) (female narrator) Speculating on the worth of royal jewels is anything but easy.

The value of the royal jewels has been estimated anything up to about £5 billion.

But frankly, it's priceless and at the same time worthless.

If you nicked one, you're never gonna be able to sell it.

(female narrator) It's no surprise that in a monarchy over 1,200 years old, Queen Elizabeth would have inherited some extraordinary and priceless pieces of jewelry.

Her treasured jewels take a prized place in Her Majesty's heart.

♪ But one of these items is extra special.

(newsreel announcer) The last and grandest symbol of all is the Crown of Saint Edward.

(female narrator) The Queen in her coronation wore the St Edward's Crown, which is named after the last Anglo-Saxon king.

It's got this connection with Saint Edward the Confessor, who was of course a saint.

(Clare) With its association with the original St Edward's Crown, a holy relic does seem to give legitimacy to the idea of a divine right to rule.

(Thomas) She believes that she is directed by God to be the Queen.

(newsreel announcer) The whole ceremony has been enacted within the framework of a communion service.

(Kate) In a religious context, the crown is like a halo.

We think of the Crown of Thorns.

We think of the laurel leaves in classical traditions.

Also, the crown makes you taller.

It makes you important.

It makes you a monarch.

(regal music) (female narrator) But the divine right to rule is no mean feat.

(Thomas) The thing about St Edward's Crown is that it's enormously heavy.

It weighs nearly five pounds.

It's completely impossible to wear it for any length of time.

(newsreel announcer) The climax of the ceremony has arrived, when the Archbishop gently sets this splendid emblem on the Queen's head.

She is very stoical, she is very, "If it's my duty, I'm going to abide by it, I'm going to do it, irrespective of my comfort."

(newsreel announcer) Long may she reign.

(cheers, applause) (female narrator) The coronation ceremony is part of what makes our Crown Jewels unique.

(Susie) Ours is the actual last working set of crown jewels in the world.

(female narrator) Yet the 300-year-old crown at the heart of our Queen's coronation nearly fell into the wrong hands.

(spirited music) (Kate) Thomas Blood formed a dastardly plan to steal the brand new Charles II's snazzy new jewels.

♪ He told the elderly jewelkeeper that he wanted to have a marriage between his nephew-- really his son-- and the jewelkeeper's daughter.

So, he went along to meet the jewelkeeper and his daughter and talk about this marriage, and then, they basically grabbed the jewelkeeper, bound him, gagged him, and made off with the jewels.

(door slams, running footsteps) I mean, they're quite hapless thieves, because Thomas Blood puts the orb down his trousers, which can't be conducive to swift movement.

He tries to squash the crown to get it in his sack, and then they try and saw the scepter in half because it's too long.

(grunting) ♪ (female narrator) Thomas Blood's plans were foiled, but in prison, he refused to talk to anyone but the King.

Strangely, his sentence was pardoned and he was sent away with a £500-a-year pension.

(Kate) Why was that?

Some say the King's in on the act.

Maybe he was part of it, wanted to create some kind of dodgy early insurance fraud.

So Thomas Blood really did find out that crime does pay.

(female narrator) Coming up: The Queen's statement brooches go viral.

(Susie) She's managed to be rude to Trump while making him think she was honoring him.

It's amazing.

(female narrator) William and Harry make a heartbreaking choice.

Those were pieces that they would have seen on her all the time.

(female narrator) What would they choose to remember their mother by?

(woman) The hands that held theirs, the arms that went 'round them, those pieces of jewelry were always there.

(stirring music) (indistinct conversation) (female narrator) The royal jewels bedazzle anyone who sees them.

♪ And the most illustrious are the Crown Jewels, kept under lock and key at the Tower of London.

♪ (Katie) Of course, we're very careful with how we protect our jewels now, but it wasn't always the case, and in the Second World War, for fear of the jewels being taken into Nazi possession, they were buried in a biscuit tin beneath the grounds of Windsor Castle.

But they survived.

-God save the Queen!

-And the trumpets sound.

(trumpet fanfare) (female narrator) Since the coronation in 1953, the St Edward's Crown has only left the tower once, for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee.

(regal music) As the head of state, the Queen also wears the Imperial State Crown.

A bill will be introduced giving greater help to those in need by reforming benefits for people with a long-term illness or disabilities.

The Imperial State Crown is the crown we know and love.

She wears it now for state occasions, for the opening of Parliament.

We associate it with her.

It's the one that, for us, makes her a monarch.

(lively music) (female narrator) This historical headgear is so significant, it has a secret life of its own.

(Clare) The Imperial State Crown travels to the state opening of Parliament in its own carriage, and I think it's because of its sheer importance.

This crown represents, in its entirety, the monarchy.

(Thomas) The crown as an object has to be treated with this reverence, as if it were some almost living thing.

(Kate) All it is is a hat covered in jewels, but yet we invest it with so much importance, so much significance, so much power, it's almost incredible.

(female narrator) It beats even the St Edward's Crown in the valuable gem department.

(Clare) In terms of sheer ostentatiousness of the crowns, undoubtedly, the Imperial State Crown is the winner.

It's a really impressive piece of jewelry.

♪ (female narrator) 2,868 diamonds.

17 sapphires, 11 emeralds, 269 pearls, and 4 rubies adorn this glorious piece -of sovereign history.

-It's set with Cullinan II as well, a really, really important diamond.

(newsreel announcer) This is the Star of Africa being reset.

(female narrator) The diamond has a glittering history.

(Daisy) The Cullinan Diamond was discovered in South Africa in 1905, was the biggest diamond in the world.

Just to give you an idea, 10 centimeters long.

So we're talking about the size of an orange or even a small grapefruit.

So this thing was an absolute monster.

(female narrator) The South African government bought it for around £12 million, in today's prices, and gave it to Edward VII as a 66th birthday present.

(ship's horn blares) And of course, the first difficulty was, they had to work out how to transport it from South Africa to Sandringham.

(suspenseful music) (female narrator) To ensure the diamond reached its destination safely, elaborate plans were hatched.

(Daisy) So they made a big song and dance about it coming by sea, surrounded by some battleships and soldiers protecting it.

(female narrator) In the end, it was sent to England in an unmarked postal box, with the decoy successfully foiling thieves.

♪ By 1910, the King had decided what to do with the jewel, and it had actually been sent to Amsterdam, where the finest jewelers of the day were working.

(female narrator) The Cullinan was cut into nine diamonds.

The biggest, at a staggering 530 carats, is known as the Cullinan I and is in the scepter of the Crown Jewels.

(fantastical music) It's the most stunning diamond in the world.

(female narrator) Six of the other diamonds form part of the Queen's private jewelry collection.

♪ The Cullinan was the most famous gem in the world.

(playful music) But sometimes, it's the less well known items of jewelry that cause the biggest stir.

The Queen is renowned for her political neutrality.

But sometimes, her accessories can get tongues wagging.

Royal brooches aren't just the shiny thing on someone's lapel that you might think they are.

(Daisy) Royal Family watchers will always look closely at brooches, 'cause they very often have a significance.

(Ingrid) There's an awful lot of story and politics and assumption woven into them as well.

If you wear the wrong brooch at the wrong occasion, it can spark all kinds of problems.

♪ (female narrator) As it did on President Trump's first visit to the UK.

("The Star-Spangled Banner") ♪ (Daisy) She wore a brooch that was given to her by Donald Trump's predecessor, Barack Obama.

(Thomas) Trump's absolute archrival, who he loathes with a passion.

(Daisy) That cannot have been a coincidence.

That was a pointed message.

(Susie) However, it wasn't a personal gift from Barack Obama's personal wallet that he'd given to his mate, Queenie.

It would have been a gift from the American people via the president to the head of the constitutional monarchy in the UK.

(playful music) I suspect it was probably a little bit cheekier than that.

She's managed to be rude to Trump while making him think she was honoring him.

It's amazing.

♪ (female narrator) On day two, there was even talk of the Queen trumping her previous choice of accessory.

(Thomas) She wore a brooch that's called the Snowflake that had been given to her by the Canadians, who, again, not at all popular with President Trump, and "snowflake" is his term for anybody who doesn't agree with him.

(indistinct remarks) One nod to a regime that wasn't Trump's favorite might have just been seen as an oversight, but two, you begin to wonder whether the Queen is sending out a subtle message through what she's wearing.

♪ (Susie) Woo hoo!

Everyone's--you know, their jaws are dropping and they're getting terribly excited.

It may be that the Queen just likes that brooch.

(female narrator) In addition to her brooches, the Queen loves a tiara and has dozens of necklaces and earrings.

And while they're worth an absolute fortune, some pieces stand out for their emotional value.

(stirring music) The Queen's engagement ring has a very romantic story to it, because when, as Princess Elizabeth, she became engaged to Prince Philip, he was just a naval officer on a naval officer's pay.

He wanted to give Lilibet something that was his and his alone.

And he got the stones from his mother's tiara and designed the ring and had it made.

(Ingrid) It's a great romance, and taking the stones from your mum's tiara solved the problem of not having any money.

(female narrator) The Queen owns a huge collection of tiaras.

Other heads of state may tower over her, but no one can beat her in the bling department.

The Queen's Russian Fringe Tiara is one of Her Majesty's favorites, so much so that she chose to wear it for her wedding.

But just hours before the ceremony, there was a spot of tiara trouble.

Something happened while she was getting ready and it was damaged, and it was rushed off to the crown jewelers under police escort in order to be repaired.

And really, the story goes that she was absolutely insistent that that's the one that she wanted to wear.

And to the untrained eye, it's not noticeable, but if you look carefully in the photographs, you can see that two of the pinnacles are just slightly further apart from each other than the others.

(female narrator) So, in the nick of time, the Queen got to wear her favorite tiara.

(crowd cheering) And at Princess Anne's wedding, she, too, wore the Russian Fringe.

(crowd cheers) But there was no such happily ever after for those who got close to an item whose history is steeped in darkness and death.

(evocative music) The Hesse Strawberry Leaf Tiara is a beautiful tiara, but it's known to be one that's seen as haunted, because it brings bad luck to pretty much anyone who owns it or wears it.

It starts out as a wonderful thing, a wedding gift from Prince Albert to his daughter, Princess Alice, on her wedding to Prince Louis of Hesse.

But Albert dies just before the wedding, and then Alice, 17 years later, she dies of diphtheria, the first of Queen Victoria's children to die.

Three of her children die in tragic circumstances, so after the death of Alice, her eldest son, Prince Ernst, takes the tiara.

Unfortunately, Ernst and his wife have quite bad luck as well, because their daughter dies of typhoid and they have a stillborn son.

♪ Ernst marries again, and his son George then inherits the tiara, and that's very unlucky, because he marries Cecilie, a sister of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

And in 1937, when Prince Philip is still a young boy, a terrible thing happens.

(newsreel announcer) At a single terrible stroke of fate, one of the oldest of Europe's royal families has been almost completely wiped out.

There was a plane crash and everyone on board dies, and Cecilie was pregnant, and she must have given birth during the flight or the crash, because the baby is also found.

Awful, terrible, but the tiara survives, through the crash, through the wreck, through the fire.

So you can see why it's known as the haunted Strawberry Leaf Tiara.

♪ (female narrator) Happily, other pieces of the Queen's collection bring joy and sparkle rather than misery.

The Queen is famously generous with her jewels, and senior royal Kate often gets first refusal.

There is a pecking order in the Royal Family, it is all about hierarchy.

And when it comes to the royal jewelry collection, -it is no different.

-For instance, when Kate first went to Canada, the Queen lent her her Maple Leaf Brooch, which was given to the Queen by the people of Canada.

So that was a mark of respect.

(cheers, applause) (female narrator) And something borrowed for Kate's wedding day was far more than added glitz.

(Clare) The wearing of a tiara really symbolizes the loss of innocence and the crowning of love.

Etiquette dictates that the first time a woman should wear a tiara, of course, is on her wedding day.

(female narrator) Princess Diana was from an aristocratic family so was able to wear the Spencer family tiara on her wedding day.

But for commoner Kate, there was a conundrum.

(Clare) Traditionally, one would wear a tiara from your father's family on your wedding day, and going forward, then wear tiaras only from your husband's family.

(female narrator) So for Kate, the Queen's collection is the gift that keeps on giving.

One tiara in particular is her favorite: the Cambridge Lover's Knot.

The Cambridge Lover's Knot Tiara, I think, is just so romantic.

(female narrator) A tiara that was made by E. Wolfe & Co. in 1914 for our queen's grandmother, Queen Mary.

This is just one of a thousand tiaras E. Wolfe & Co. have made across a hundred years.

(Richard) To us, this isn't the Cambridge Lover's Knot Tiara.

It's 20207.

Just looks fantastic.

It's a really smart bit of jewelry.

It's got movement, it's got shape.

(female narrator) It's a tiara that's very popular with the Royal Family, especially Princess Diana.

(Katie) Diana loved the Cambridge Lover's Knot Tiara.

It's an incredibly romantic tiara.

(Clare) Not only do you have a continuous row of lover's knots, but you have pearls for purity, and pearls, of course, are for Venus, the goddess of love, who was born of the sea.

(Katie) Kate has made that tiara hers.

It is her namesake, being the Cambridge Lover's Knot Tiara, and it is a deeply romantic tiara.

(lively music) Kate and William sort of personify that royal romance, so it seems very fitting that it's now hers.

(female narrator) As you might expect, jewelry with this sort of pedigree takes a long time to create.

♪ (Richard) A tiara, even with modern tools, will take 500 hours, and it will keep a setter, who's the guy who puts the stones into the mount, about 20 days to actually set one.

(female narrator) E. Wolfe & Co.'s archives contain two original design books.

(Richard) Some of them have thousands of stones.

I mean, we have made tiaras that have only had 30 or 40 stones in them.

I felt I should explain it's a tiara, yes, but you know, I haven't really got the hairstyle to put hairpins in to secure it, but it's certainly very good for your sense of poise as you walk around wearing a tiara.

I recommend it.

(female narrator) The Queen doesn't just lend tiaras.

She also lends brooches to those close to her heart.

The Order of Queen Elizabeth II is an important gift bestowed by Her Majesty to several members of her family.

In 2017, she awarded it to the Duchess of Cambridge, but caring Kate insisted on putting her own stamp on the piece.

(Clare) For the first time in its history, this portrait miniature is actually on glass and not on ivory, which was the traditional medium, and I think that's absolutely in support of Prince William's stance against the trade in ivory.

...improving their incentives to keep endangered species safe.

It's a way for William and Harry of keeping their mother alive and almost bringing her spirit into their happiness.

(stirring music) (female narrator) Coming up: We discover the secret jewelry link between Kate and Princess Diana... ♪ Instantly, I knew that it was the ring.

(female narrator) ...and meet the designer behind the Queen Mother's very special brooch.

(designer) And there's elements of it which are a bit macabre.

♪ (female narrator) Princess Diana made a lasting impact on the world's media with her individual sense of style.

And her jewelry choices were no different.

The most important piece of her legacy from her personal collection is her now famous engagement ring.

♪ (Ingrid) The Princess of Wales's sapphire and diamond engagement ring came from Garrard, the Crown Jewelers, and the story I was told by Stephen Barry, who was Prince Charles's valet at the time and he was there, was that Prince Charles ordered this tray of rings be brought to the palace, and she just picked the biggest one.

♪ (Daisy) Anyone who takes a look at it can see it's a stunning ring.

Massive sapphire, clearly very, very beautiful, but people dubbed it, "the Commoner's Ring."

(Susie) It was bought off the shelf, and it was considered to be a little bit, um, how can I put it, sort of almost like the horsey set or upper class, rather than royal.

(Daisy) I think the reaction said more about how snobby many commentators at the time were, rather than her choice or her taste in jewelry.

A £30,000 rock would still keep most of us perfectly happy, wouldn't it?

(melancholy music) (female narrator) Ironically, when Diana's marriage broke down, the status of the engagement ring went up.

(Katie) It has become, I would say, one of the most iconic and certainly the most recognizable pieces of jewelry ever worn by a member of the Royal Family.

(Ingrid) Anything that's to do with Princess Diana becomes priceless because of the Greek tragedy surrounding her life.

♪ (female narrator) After Princess Diana's tragic death, Princes William and Harry were each allowed to pick a piece from their mother's jewelry collection.

Harry chose his mother's engagement ring, while William chose her Cartier watch.

Those are pieces that they would have seen on her all the time, you know, the hands that held theirs, the arms that went 'round them.

Those pieces of jewelry were always there.

(Ingrid) When William became engaged first to Kate Middleton, Harry very magnanimously and generously said, "Come on, Wills.

You have the ring, I don't need it."

(female narrator) It was William's way of paying tribute to his mother on the biggest day of his life.

(William) It's my way of making sure my mother didn't miss out on today and the excitement and the fact that we're going to spend the rest of our lives together.

I remember being with William and Kate on the afternoon of their engagement.

Instantly, I knew that it was the ring, it was Diana's ring.

It was so synonymous with the Princess of Wales, and it was the first thing I mentioned to them after saying congratulations.

"Wow, that's the ring."

(evocative music) (female narrator) Like her fashion style, Diana's jewelry choices went on breaking royal convention (Katie) I think Diana was really clever at how she refashioned some of the royal jewelry collection.

(Ingrid) The Queen Mother gave her the most beautiful sapphire brooch, but it was far too heavy and old fashioned for Diana to wear as a brooch.

So she turned it into the centerpiece of a pearl choker, which is what she wore when she danced with John Travolta at the White House.

♪ I can see Diana dancing with him now.

♪ (Katie) She had the finest jewelry from the royal collection, but she loved to go down to High Street Kensington and buy cheap jewelry.

♪ (Ingrid) But of course, she was the People's Princess, so she related to the people.

She might be wearing £20 earrings and a £26,000 ring, but she wasn't always covered in expensive jewelry, so people loved that about her.

(female narrator) Like mother, like son, Harry's jewelry is also more meaning over money.

(Susie) Harry's got this black and gold metal bangle, which we think he got on one of his first-- earliest trips to Africa.

(TV reporter) And like any schoolboy, he picked up a souvenir to take home.

(Susie) And he's been wearing it almost 20 years, pretty much constantly ever since, and it obviously means a lot to him.

-It's beautiful.

-Harry also placed jewels from Africa and his late mother on the finger of his fiancée, Meghan.

(Harry) The ring is obviously yellow gold, because that's her favorite, and the main stone itself I sourced from Botswana, and the little diamonds either side are from my mother's jewelry collection.

The gift of that ring by William was clearly very, very romantic and very sentimental, but I would equally be thrilled to have been Meghan and to have received a ring that, you know, my fiancé had put so much thought into.

♪ That ring really proves Harry to be the ultimate romantic.

Very clever choice, and it's unique, it's modern, it's fresh, and it's something that Meghan can make her own.

(regal music) (female narrator) The jewels on Meghan's engagement ring aren't the only ones from Diana's collection she wears.

(Claudia) It's become known in royal circles as "the Divorce Ring."

When Diana and Charles broke up, Diana, instead of getting a new haircut, as a lot of us would do, treated herself to this whopping great aquamarine ring, which she wore a lot.

♪ (female narrator) As with many gemstones in the royal jewelry box, the aquamarine has a dramatic tale of its own.

There's a story that has been doing the rounds in the jewelry trade for many, many years about a gem hunter who bought an aquamarine overseas, and it proved to be a little bit tricky to get back to the UK, so he had to put it somewhere discreet on his person in order to get it out of the country, and the next time he saw it, it was on the front cover of a magazine, being worn by the Princess of Wales.

(Ingrid) It reappeared very romantically on Meghan's hand when she and Harry left Windsor Castle to go to Frogmore House for their reception, and there was Diana's aquamarine ring.

(playful music) ♪ (female narrator) Being a royal princess doesn't mean you have unlimited access to everything in the royal collection.

Meghan's choice of jewelry I think reflects her relationship with her husband more at the moment than her relationship with the Queen.

There was that big kerfuffle when Meghan Markle wanted to wear the tiara that Princess Eugenie had already had earmarked, and quite rightly, she was excluded from wearing it.

Harry exploded in rage and said, "What Meghan wants, Meghan gets," and the Queen reportedly responded, "No, she doesn't.

She gets what I give her.

It's my tiara.

Shut up."

(photographers shouting) (Daisy) I think the difference between Eugenie and Meghan is one has known for her whole life that she's going to have a royal wedding and has probably been looking at the jewelry for her whole life, imagining, you know, "Which tiara would I have?"

Perhaps Meghan was only allowed to choose from the third-class tiaras, and Eugenie got to choose from the first-class tiaras.

They have to borrow something from Granny, so make nice with Granny.

(regal fanfare) ♪ (female narrator) Eventually, neither princess got the tiara they'd eyed.

Princess Eugenie instead chose and emerald-and-diamond tiara by Boucheron, known as the Greville Emerald Kokoshnik.

(Clare) The emerald in the center weighs nearly 100 carats.

They are of the most divine quality.

(Ingrid) Eugenie looked magnificent in that tiara.

The dress was designed around that fabulous piece of jewelry.

(Clare) I think with her red hair, she absolutely knocked it out of the park with that one.

(female narrator) Royal tiaras add value and drama to any wedding outfit.

(Susie) There's no way you can put a price on these things, but we like to say, this is worth more than that one, that one's worth more than the other.

One million for Kate's tiara, a couple of million for Meghan's, maybe five, even ten million for Eugenie's.

♪ (female narrator) Meghan's personal jewels are not just about money or glitter.

Meghan and Harry will often wear jewelry that raises money for charities, such as mental health.

We've seen Harry and William both wear rubber bracelets for Help for Heroes.

I think Meghan is incredibly conscious of the image that she projects.

(female narrator) Through a jewelry collection reported to be worth £600,000.

(Claudia) The Royal Family is much more conscious of the messages they send through their jewelry, how ethical the jewelry is, where the stones come from, and perhaps even the cost.

♪ (quaint traditional music) (female narrator) Whilst jewels can make a statement, one hidden message nearly changed the course of British history.

♪ (Kate) In the midst of the febrile fight between Catholics and Protestants for the nation's heart and the throne, Elizabeth's concerned that she's going to lose everything because she has no heirs, she's not married, there's no more children.

Who's going to get the throne?

One woman, Margaret Douglas, has a jewel made, and this is known as the Lennox Darnley Jewel.

Margaret Douglas has seen everything.

She's see her son die.

She's been thrust out of the court.

She is thinking of her grandson, James.

She wants him to come to the throne.

(female narrator) In 1571, Margaret, Countess of Lennox, set on a mission to seize power from Elizabeth I, commissions a jewel luxuriously encoded with treachery.

(Kate) If anyone found it, she could deny it, say they were just pictures.

Margaret's ambitions can't be written in a letter, but she knows this brooch is treason.

Elizabeth's got her eye on her.

She's still ultimately powerful.

And if she found out about this jewel, Margaret would be in real trouble.

This jewel could be implying an uprising against Elizabeth.

Around the jewel is inscribed, essentially, "Slow and steady wins the race."

There was a depiction of a warrior holding a woman by the hair.

Is that Elizabeth?

Is that her being taken away, losing her throne, James coming to it?

Most excitingly of all, there is a pelican drawing blood from its own breast to give to its offspring.

Every part of her ambition, because she was ambitious, is focused on this tiny child, James.

(female narrator) Margaret saw her ambition fulfilled, with James IV of Scotland eventually crowned James I of England.

(stirring music) So, from the discreet jeweled power plays of the Darnley Lennox to something a little less subtle.

(Susie) Well, the first time Meghan met the extended members of the Royal Family at Buckingham Palace, Princess Michael of Kent was pictured driving through the gates wearing a blackamoor brooch.

(female narrator) Blackamoor refers to a 17th century art form that's a specialty of Venice.

It depicts highly decorative, bejeweled, glamorous men.

♪ This was beyond belief.

It's slavery, fundamentally, and Meghan is descended from slaves.

And it was considered racist, disgusting, abhorrent, rude, bad manners.

She didn't think.

I'm sure she's never worn it again.

And she was forced to apologize, it was quite humiliating.

(female narrator) While some royal brooches cause a stir, others reflect personal interests.

For the Queen Mother, it was her beloved fishing.

In 1999, jeweler Rachel Jeffrey was approached by the Salmon and Trout Association.

They wanted to commemorate their patron's 100th birthday.

(Rachel) I got the call to say, "You've been chosen to produce this piece for the Queen Mother."

Um, I was really excited, I do remember having a very lovely afternoon in a local pub, and then it was kind of down to work, really.

I was given a fishing fly as my inspiration, because the Queen Mother loved her fishing.

I remember sitting at the kitchen table at home, looking at a fish hook, and, you know, there's elements of it which I think are a bit macabre, is that a word?

(she laughs) I wanted to remove that connection of it being quite a practical but slightly brutal piece.

(female narrator) Rachel produced design drawings.

She turned the hook sideways, change a blob of tar at the tip of the fly into a pearl, and swapped feathers representing the Queen Mother's fishing colors for sapphires, rubies, and emeralds.

My friends are telling me that possibly you're not gonna get paid for the project.

I've also got the dilemma that I've got my tongue piercing in.

Should I take that tongue piercing out?

Some friends said it's not gonna be the right image to portray if you've got your tongue pierced.

(flame softly roars) (female narrator) Rachel's personal jewelry survived the day, and her brooch design would be the right catch for the Salmon and Trout Association.

"Rachel, how much do you want for your sketches?"

And because I hadn't really anticipated that I was gonna get paid, I didn't really have a figure in my mind, so I was like, "Oh, £200," and they're like, "Oh, yes, fine."

(female narrator) Rachel went back to her workshop and created a 3-D sample, which is a great keepsake.

(Rachel) It's slightly different to the one that the Queen Mum's got, 'cause the one that was made for the Queen Mum had diamonds on the shoulders.

So up here it had white and cognac diamonds on the top here.

(female narrator) So what was to become of Rachel's royal connection?

(Rachel) I didn't see the Queen Mother wearing the brooch, unfortunately.

But when I was on a trip down to Cornwall and I was reading the newspaper, and I saw a picture of Camilla and Prince Charles, and I suddenly looked, and she had tweeds on.

I looked a bit closer and I noticed that she actually had the brooch on.

Didn't notice it straightaway, because she's actually got it on upside down.

But I was, like, turning the paper over and looking at it, and you can see that it was actually my brooch.

I think people see it as like a crown of feathers rather than that way up, which is the fish are flying.

(female narrator) Coming up: Princess Margaret gets into hot water.

Great picture, very sexy, too.

And of course, she then published it.

(female narrator) And the queen of Hollywood bags her some real royal bling.

(Ingrid) ...ended up with Elizabeth Taylor.

It was the first piece of jewelry she'd ever had to buy for herself, and she'd set her heart on these Welsh feathers.

♪ (regal music) (female narrator) Royal jewelry is full of colorful stories and whispered secrets.

♪ It's their history that gives these tantalizing treasures their true value, though it's only after the death of a royal that jewels can acquire a public price.

The thing about royal jewelry is it has provenance.

Anything that has provenance bumps the price up hugely.

(female narrator) The bigger the story, the bigger the cash bonus.

When Wallis Simpson, wife of an uncrowned king, died, her jewels were sold at auction by Sotheby's in Geneva in 1987.

(reporter) There's a Japanese businessman upped the price!

(Ingrid) They went for crazy prices because theirs was the greatest romance.

This man gave up a throne for this woman and showered her with jewelry, so that story is never going to die, regardless of what you might think about Wallis Simpson.

Their romance was the best in the century.

(female narrator) The thunderous £31 million raised on that day was quite a legacy to the love story of Wallis Simpson and Edward, Prince of Wales, while individual items also had a tale to tell.

(Clare) One of the pieces was a beautiful bracelet, just a simple chain set with multiple gemstone crosses, and all engraved on the back with often quite unusual inscriptions.

(Thomas) It turned out they had a very strange way of marking the progress of their romance, so one of the crosses commemorated her appendix operation, and another one was marking the assassination attempt that had been made on him.

Not quite what you'd expect.

(resplendent music) (female narrator) One piece of her jewelry was about to start an exciting journey of its own after being sold for a mere £400,000.

One of the most iconic brooches ever was the Prince of Wales' feathers in diamonds, which was given to Wallis Simpson by the Duke of Windsor.

They were always tokens of immense love and devotion.

It ended up with Elizabeth Taylor.

It was the first piece of jewelry she'd ever had to buy for herself, and she'd set her heart on these Welsh feathers, because, you know, Richard Burton was Welsh.

And so it ended up with her, not our Prince of Wales.

(female narrator) Elizabeth Taylor loved the brooch so much, she wore it until her death in 2011.

(auctioneer) 320,000.

320,000, your bid, sir, here.

Your bid, yes sir... (female narrator) The combination of British royalty and Hollywood royalty means added value for this brooch.

I mean, the prices were unbelievable.

They went for crazy prices.

It goes to an unknown buyer, we don't know where it is, and fetches around £1 million.

(suspenseful music) (female narrator) This wasn't the only royal auction that caused a controversy.

In 2006, four years after her death, Princess Margaret's Poltimore Tiara -stole the show.

-The Poltimore Tiara was acquired by Princess Margaret in advance of her wedding to the future Lord Snowdon.

The public appetite for this particular piece was such that when it came up for auction, the auction house estimated £150,000 to £200,000, and it made just shy of £1 million.

(female narrator) The blingy showiness of past generations of royals may seem to be slowly disappearing.

(Clare) The Duchess of Sussex was seen recently in a pair of earrings that are made by a company that use synthetic diamonds, and this is a real sea change.

The Royal Family has been associated with some of the most famous diamonds in the world, and here we see the younger generation making a choice that sets them apart from others.

(Katie) Whether the stones that the new royals wear are old or new, whether they're ethically sourced or pieces that have been passed down from generations, I think we're always going to be endlessly fascinated with royal jewels.

With a new generation of royals, we'll have a new tide of wonderful stories in relation to those jewels.

(female narrator) Whatever the size or style of their jewelry, the next generation of royals will add history and value to these national treasures.

There's also the sense in which the jewels can carry the history of the Royal Family -in a very powerful way.

-They are a way of showcasing the royals to the world, and such an important way of continuing a wonderful, colorful history that is as bright as the jewels themselves.

(evocative music) (Kate) They will always have these stories of drama, of romance, of murder and tragedy.

Because nothing attracts these stories like jewels.

(Johann Strauss II, "Voices of Spring" waltz) ♪ (bright music)