Today I would like to tell a story, that happened 120 years ago. My and yours countryman took part in this story.

Frauds were more sophisticated and extravagant 120 years ago, and they were performed by great masters.

In spring of 1896, Louvre announced the acquisition of the masterpiece of jeweler’s art - ancient King Saytaferna’s tiara. According to legend, Olbia masters gifted it to the king.

Louvre paid for tiara a huge amount of money for those days - 200 000 francs and proudly started to exhibit it. Tiara was engraved with inscription - "Great and invincible Saytaferna with honor from council and the people of Olbia". According to French archaeologists this engravement obviously proved the ancient origin of the masterpiece.

However, it very quickly became clear that "Tiara of Saitaferne" is fake made by brilliant Israel jeweler Ruhomovskogo from Odessa.

But Ruhomovsky did not even suspect that he made ancient kings tiara.

Journalists found him and in order to confirm his authorship, they took the master to Paris.

Israel Ruhomovsky was born in 1860 in a religious Jewish family and was a late child. He attended heder and his parents hoped that their son would become a rabbi. However, once the boy received a pencil and penknife as a gift and since then he was constantly drawing and cutting out all kinds of figures.

Israel Ruhomovsky was a self-taught genius: he studied jewelry engravement by himself and worked in the best jewelry shops in Kiev. For example, Joseph Marshak, the largest competitor of Faberge, constantly ordered the jewelry made by Ruhomovsky. And then he moved to Odessa and opened his own store. He worked unofficially because of he could not buy a special license due to the lack of money.

There were disputes in Paris regarding the tiara, but soon they stopped: Ruhomovsky brought to Paris a whole suitcase of drawings, how he created this tiara, and then in the presence of experts simply reproduced some of its fragments.

The most surprising was that he was not arrested and charged for fraud: as I said, he did not even know about the appointment of his product. It was two fraudsters from Odessa - Gohman brothers who sold fake antiquities, ordered tiara.

For “a truly royal tiara”, which Ruhomovsky made in just 8 months, fraudsters paid 2 000 rubles to master. Must say that the scandal with tiara brought benefits to Ruhomovsky: he become a real celebrity, won a gold medal of the Paris Salon and tiara is still exhibited in Louvre with engravement "Made by Ruhomovsky"

Later, after the start of anti-Jewish pograms, in 1905 he and his family finally moved to Paris and began to work on the restoration of the Louvre workshops with the best artists of his time. Soon famous banker Edmond de Rotshild become his client.

Today, on the wall of a modest house on Osipova st. in Odessa you can find a memorable sign, where you can read a story about this remarkable man who worked here.

By my opinion this story is remarkable, that the destiny of many famous masters in our country: to become famous and get a well-deserved fame in his home country, they must first be recognized by the whole world. Let's pay more attention to those who are around us now and appreciate what we have. We have everything, but we just have to realize it by ourselves.