NPPF Comm3: The Crown Jewels

[Jasper Fidget]

p. 129
"the crown jewels"

Probably inspired by the story of the execution of Tsar Nicholas II and
family.  The legend goes that when the family was summoned to the basement
in order to be shot by the Bolsheviks, the children had diamonds, sapphires,
and other jewels sewn into their clothing, effectively serving as bullet
proof vests that may have saved some of their lives.  Since then there has
been great speculation regarding the ultimate whereabouts of the Romanov
fortune, whether it had been taken by the Bolsheviks, smuggled out of the
country, or hidden someplace in or around Ekaterinburg.

http://www.lostsecrets.com/
http://www.concentric.net/~Tsarskoe/

In reply to Alfred Appel Jr's question concerning the secret whereabouts of
the crown jewels, VN said, "In the ruins, sir, of some old barracks near
Kobaltana; but do not tell it to the Russians."

Kobaltana, the only Zemblan place found in the Index but not in the text, is
listed as: "a once fashionable mountain resort near the ruins of some old
barracks now a cold and desolate spot of difficult access and no importance
but still remembered in military families and forest castles, not in the
text" (p. 310).

Boyd notes that "Kobaltana" is pretty close in sound to "Cedarn Utana," a
small resort near the Idoming border "again a ghost town" (C.609-614) in
"these grim autumnal mountains" (C.71, 100), where Kinbote sits at his
typewriter to annotate Shade's manuscript. (Boyd, _Magic_, 102).  The crown
jewels then are the cards of John Shade's poem "Pale Fire."

I would add to that evidence the scene where Kinbote's armors himself with
the poem (p. 300), filling out his clothes in much the same way the Romanov
children were said to have done with literal jewels.  There's also some
allusion that the crown jewels are actually hidden in Kinbote's pants
("broken bits of a nutshell" p. 131, "crown, necklace, scepter" p. 244),
thus a pun on the Romanov story (or just a symptom of my low-brow sense of
humor).

Jasper Fidget