NEW DELHI, Nov 8: A slice from the extravagant cake served at Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip’s wedding in 1947 has been sold almost 80 years later.
The 77-year-old slice of 200-kg cake which was served at the royal wedding on November 20, 1947, was sold for ₹2.36 lakh ($2,800) in Scotland. Almost eight decades later, the neatly-wrapped cake survived the test of time in a small box embossed with the silver insignia of a then-Princess Elizabeth stamped on it. The box was sent from the Buckingham Palace to the housekeeper at Holyrood House in Edinburgh Marion Polson, as a gift from the royal couple after their lavish wedding.
Along with the cake, the late queen also wrote a letter to Polson thanking her for “a delightful wedding present.” “We are both enchanted with the dessert service; the different flowers and the beautiful colouring will, I know, be greatly admired by all who see it,” it read. While it is not known what the gift was, the queen said the couple will use it “constantly, and whenever we shall think of the kindness and good wishes for our happiness which it represents.”
The slice of cake belongs to Elizabeth and Philip’s extravagant wedding cake which was a staggering nine-foot tall creation, which weighed over 200 kg. Over 2,000 slices were cut from the cake for the wedding guests and the rest of the cake was sent to charities and other organisations. Interestingly, one tier of the cake was kept for Prince Charles’ christening.
Slices of the decades old royal cake have been sold before. One of them fetched $2,300 in 2013. Similarly, part of the cake served at King Charles and Princess Diana’s wedding was sold for $2,565 at an auction in 2021.
(Manas Dasgupta)