It’s fairly unusual for Queen Elizabeth to wear turquoise jewelry, so when she sat for a national address

Sunday
evening—only her fourth during her 68-year reign—her diamond and turquoise brooch was yet more evidence that
she is living through an unusual time. The gem’s blue tone stood out against her emerald green crepe dress, its
diamond-encrusted filigrees gently catching the light in the queen’s Windsor Castle sitting room.

The brooch itself is one she’s only seldom worn since inheriting it in 1953; she didn’t wear it at all in public until
2014, when she wore it on a visit to Derbyshire. It came into her possession along with much more jewelry that her
paternal grandmother, Queen Mary, passed on to her when she died at the age of 85. The Queen Mary jewels are
nearly only spotted on special occasions. Mary gave the queen the tiara she wore for her wedding, and the diamond
jubilee necklace she’s worn to processions through the years. The tiara that Meghan Markle wore when she married
Prince Harry also came from Mary’s collection. Though she’s provided the emblems for the family’s happiest
moments, Mary’s reign also coincided with some of the most difficult events in world history—including a pandemic
flu that may be the closest historical comparison to what we are now living through.