Admiral Lord Nelson, Ottoman Diplomacy and the Chelengk Jewel

Martyn Downer
Lord Nelson’s diamond Chelengk or ‘Plume of Triumph’ is one of the most famous jewels in British history. Presented to the admiral by Sultan Selim III of Turkey after the Battle of the Nile in 1798, the jewel had thirteen diamond rays, to represent the ships captured at the battle, above a wreath (çelenk in Turkish) of enamel flowers centred with a rotating Ottoman star powered by clockwork. Entirely mounted en tremblent, the Chelengk was a dynamic and spellbinding achievement of Ottoman goldsmithing. Highly-cultivated, Selim used the precious jewel to help forge an alliance with the British against French aggression in the Eastern Mediterranean which threatened his sprawling empire. Loaded with meaning, it was the first such Islamic reward to a non-Muslim military leader and caused a sensation back in England. Nelson adopted the Chelengk as his heraldic crest, wearing it on his naval hat like a Turban jewel sparking a fashion craze but earning the disapproval of George III. Endlessly reproduced in the many portraits and representations of England’s greatest naval hero, the Chelengk became Nelson’s trademark, a glittering emblem of the short-lived treaty between east and west.
Stolen from the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich in 1951 the jewel is now lost, presumed destroyed. This talk will explore the history of the jewel, its political context in the often-fraught relationship between London and Constantinople in the late eighteenth century, and how a remarkable drawing recently discovered at the College of Arms has enabled an exact replica to be made.