Botswana’s President Mokgweetsi Masisi looks at a large diamond discovered in Botswana at his office in Gaborone on 22 August 2024. (Monirul Bhuiyan / AFP)
- The world’s second-biggest diamond, a massive 2 492-carat stone, was discovered in Botswana by Canadian mining company Lucara.
- Many major diamond discoveries have taken place in Southern Africa.
- Here are some other famous diamond discoveries.
After the reported discovery of the world’s second-biggest diamond in Botswana, a massive 2492-carat stone by Canadian mining company Lucara, here are other famous diamond discoveries:
Biggest ever: The Cullinan
The largest gem-quality diamond ever found, by far, is believed to be The Cullinan, discovered in 1905 in South Africa and weighing 3106 carats.
Queen Elizabeth II wearing her Cullinan V diamond brooch. (Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty Images)
Replica of the Cullinan Diamond, the largest non carbonado and largest gem-quality diamond ever found, at 3106.75 carat rough weight. (Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
Among the stones cut from it was the Star of Africa, which is part of the British crown jewels on display in the Tower of London.
Dethroned: Sewelô
The 1758-carat Sewelô diamond was, until Thursday, the second-biggest diamond in history.
It was mined in Botswana, also by Lucara, in 2019.
Luxury group LVMH, owned by Bernard Arnault, previously listed as the world’s richest man, bought the tennis-ball-sized diamond in January 2020.
Lesedi La Rona
The 1109-carat Lesedi La Rona – a diamond also the size of a tennis ball – was discovered at Karowe, northeastern Botswana, also by Lucara in November 2015.
It was bought by British jeweller Laurence Graff for $53 million in September 2017.
Guards stand next to the 1109-carat rough Lesedi La Rona diamond, the biggest rough diamond discovered in more than a century, at Sotheby’s on 4 May 2016 in New York City. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
Many discoveries in Botswana
Other exceptional diamonds have been found over the past four years in Botswana by Lucara (1174 carats in June 2021, 1080 carats in August 2023 and 998 carats in November 2020) and by Debswana, which is jointly owned by the South African government and diamond company De Beers (1098 carats in June 2021).
A huge mining truck hauls a big load of ore from the pit at Orapa mine, the largest diamond mine in the world on 17 March 2008 in Orapa, Botswana. (Per-Anders Pettersson/Getty Images)
The Excelsior
The Excelsior Diamond, found in 1893 in South Africa, weighed 995 carats uncut. The biggest stone cut from it is 69 carats, which was bought in 1996 by the jeweller Robert Mouawad.
The Star of Sierra Leone
The diamond was found in Sierra Leone in 1972 and weighed just under 969 carats and yielded 17 stones, the biggest of which is 53.96 carats.
Sierra Leonean academic, diplomat and physician Davidson Nicol (1924-1994) holding the Star of Sierra Leone diamond at the Sierra Leone High Commission in London, England, 30 June 1972. (M. Stroud/Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
Lesotho
British miner Gem Diamonds said in January 2018 it had discovered the 910-carat stone at the Letšeng mine in the landlocked southern African country of Lesotho.
The Incomparable
The stone weighing 890 carats was found in the 1980s in what was then Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of Congo, by a young girl playing outside her house near the tailings of a mine. The biggest stone cut from it is 407 carats.
Royal Ontario Museum Preparator Susan Ventura sets a satellite diamond beside The Incomparable Diamond inside a walk-in gem vault during the set-up of an exhibition titled The Nature of Diamonds that opens in Toronto, Ontario, on 25 October. (Pawel Dwulit/Toronto Star via Getty Images)