The thread on which hand a wedding or engagement ring goes on vary’s with the culture brings up the question of when did the diamond become the standard for these rings.
I have heard that it was the result of perhaps the most successful advertising campaign in the history of advertising. The story goes that around the turn of the century DeBeers had only the limited industrial market and the occasional Rajah, prince or playboy as a buyer for their large stones. Some genius suggested that they convince ordinary women to emulate, in a small way, the European aristocracy by wearing diamonds. What better way to sell the smaller stones that whenever women got married and even when they got engaged they were to demand a diamond ring?
Marilyn Monroe … here’s the YouTube video where she tells us all about it.
So … in 1953 … it was strictly illegal for De Beer’s to advertise in the United States … they’re a cartel and and that’s a felony here. So instead they got Miss Monroe to wear 100 carets of the stuff and sing about it … who else you gonna buy any from … clever.
The song plays on an idea that was already part of the broader social consciousness (and, of course, had already been when the song debuted in the stage production 4 years before Monroe performed it in the film). Anita Loos’ novel Gentlemen Prefer Blondes had come out in 1925 and had been serialized in Harper’s Bazaar previous to publication as a book.
The character from the original stories in Harper’s was just as fond of diamonds as is the character portrayed by Monroe 28 years later. The lyrics of the song take direct inspiration from the line in the original novel, “Kissing your hand may make you feel very very good but a diamond and safire bracelet lasts forever.”
It has already been pointed out that, before diamonds became the jewel associated with marriage that every young girl aspired to have (which is a twentieth-century development) they were highly-prized jewels associated with the very rich and the very powerful. Diamonds have had pre-eminent value as gemstones for centuries, particularly in India (which has also had diamond mines for a long time). But, precisely because of this pre-eminence, most people never aspired to own them. This would have bee a wholly unrealistic aspiration for anyone but the fabulously wealthy. Even if people did aspire to greater wealth, that aspiration was probably not focussed on the acquisition of diamonds but on land, houses, servants, cash, useful goods or even gold.
This starts to change in the nineteenth century when significant diamond deposits are discovered and developed in America, South Africa, etc. The developers want more people to aspire to own diamonds, since this will enlarge the market into which they can sell.
At first they do so by saying, basically, yes, you too can aspire to own an object of value, even if only a small one. As we all know from the song and the preceding novel, diamonds are “a girl’s best friend” because they (supposedly) hold their value. Men grow cold as girls grow old, and we all lose are charms in the end. But square-cut or pear-shaped, these rocks don’t lose their shape. Basically, you use your looks to earn diamonds, which you can then turn into cash at the point where your looks will no longer generate the kind of attention, and therefore material resources, that they once did.
Practical, perhaps, but not very aspirational, so after the war de Beers attempted to counter this perception of diamonds as an efficient store of value against a rainy day by promoting a different idea; diamonds as an eternal symbol of love. Men are encouraged to give diamonds as a sign of love and commitment rather than as a reward for a lady’s favours, and women should keep those diamonds forever because selling them would be to renounce or betray that love.
There is a series that started on CollegeHumor, and is now on television somewhere called “Adam ruins everything” that deals with things like this. Your question reminded me that I had seen a segment on engagement rings and diamonds, so I fished up the clip.
Nothing that isn't covered already, it seems, but is interesting (in my opinion) and related.
Thanks to all – Suspicions Confirmed. It really was a stroke of genius and the greatest advertising coup ever. They are not worthless however but are used in large quantities by industry in cutting tools and optical grinding powders.
I think it’s funny that brown diamonds- once thought mostly worthless and used for grinding, are not marketed as “chocolate diamonds”.:rolleyes: Many, some women are so gullible, and of course the men too, for buying them.
Here is what particularly blows my mind. You know how they tell synthetic diamonds from natural ones? The synthetic ones are flawless.
So you think I should buy a colorless rock, that has no inherent value, can only be resold for maybe 1/10th of its cost, probably with some little African’s child on it, and to make matters worse you are selling me a FLAWED product?
And yet still women demand diamonds and men give up so much of their salary to buy one. And we don’t give diamonds to men. It’s a very unequal relationship. For the amount of money you generally spend on a diamond, you could spend a fraction of that on a synthetic, or maybe even on a different stone, and put the rest towards a honeymoon or maybe a house. Actual experiences!