FABERGE EGGS

Easter is the most joyful celebration of the Orthodox faith in

Russia.

After church services, families gather to exchange gifts of

decorated eggs, symbols of renewed life and hope.

The Easter of 1885 marked the twentieth anniversary of Czar

Alexander III and Czarina Maria Fedorovna, and the Czar needed

an exceptional gift for his wife.

He commissioned a young jeweler, Peter Carl Faberge, who’s

work had recently caught his wife’s eye.

On Easter morning, Faberge delivered to the palace what

appeared to be a simple enameled egg.

To the delight of the Empress, inside was a golden yolk; within

the yolk was a golden hen; and concealed within the hen was a

diamond miniature of the royal crown and a tiny ruby egg.

His wife’s delight was all that Czar needed to reward Faberge with

an egg commission every year.

The requirements were straightforward:

each egg must be unique

Each must contain a suitable surprise for the Empress

With consummate craftsmanship and an inventive spirit, Faberge

repeatedly met the challenge, borrowing inspiration from the

gilded lives of Czar and Czarina.

In October of 1894 the Czar’s health failed.

He died suddenly in the prime of life and his son Nicholas II

ascended the throne.

Not prepared to be a Czar, Nicholas decided to just continue on

with all the things his father had done, including the tradition of

the Easter Egg.

Nicholas continued the commission for his mother’s egg and added another order for his new wife, Czarina AlexandreaFedorovan.

So imaginatively conceived and opulently executed, Faberge’s work elevated jewelry to a decorative art unequaled since the Renaissance.

At the 1900 World Exhibition in Paris, the Imperial eggs were shown in public for the first time.

The eggs astounded the jury, which showered Faberge with honors and his fame spread throughout Europe.

Faberge’s workshops became flooded with commissions, transforming an ordinary goldsmith shop into the famous “House of Faberge.”

Year by year, Faberge’s Imperial Easter Eggs reached new heights of invention and extravagance, expressions in miniature of the imperial privilege.

Ultimately, these eggs would become painful reminders of the tragic events to come.

All of the elements of the Romanov story came together most

elegantly in the Fifteenth Anniversary egg (1911).

It was a family album just over five inches tall.

Exquisitely detailed paintings depicted the most notable events of

the reign of Nicholas II and each of the family members.

There are his five children, all these sort of glamorous events

surrounding their lives, and there they are looking happy and

unknowing what was going to happen to them just a few years

later.

During the first months of Russia’s involvement in World War I,

the simmering discontent of the troubled nation is cooled by

patriotic unity in defense of the motherland.

Russia’s dismal economic conditions made it impossible for

Nicholas to sustain the war effort against powerful, industrialized

Germany.

By 1917, famine threatened the country, riots and strikes

demanding bread were common in Moscow and St. Petersburg.

When the Imperial troops joined the demonstrators, the

government collapsed to the revolution.

On March 15th with neither the support of the people n0r the

aristocracy, Nicolas was forced to resign.

The next day a decree was passed, ordering the arrest of

Nicholas II and all other members of the Romanov family.

The Czar and his family were eventually removed to Siberia

where they were held captive for over a year.

On July 17th, 1918 Nicholas, his wife, and his five children were

hearded into a basement and executed.

Of the immidiate family, only Nicholas’ mother escaped the

assassins.

As she made a hasty departure from her homeland, she brought

with her the Order of St. George egg, the last Faberge Imperial

Easter egg she would ever receive from her son.