A scrap metal dealer at an American flea market bought a small golden egg on a lion-paw tripod, planning to melt it down. Nobody would pay scrap value, so it sat on his kitchen counter for years until a 2012 Google search revealed it was the lost 1887 Third Imperial Easter Egg, worth tens of millions. This episode traces the rise and fall of Peter Carl Fabergé and his workshop, beginning in the paranoid atmosphere of 1880s Russia, when Nihilists had assassinated Alexander II and sent the new imperial couple an Easter egg containing a dagger, two skulls, and a threat.

We open the first imperial egg, the 1885 Hen Egg, with its nested golden yolk, hen, crown, and ruby pendant, and explain how its success made Fabergé official supplier to the court with a mandate of one unique surprise every Easter, fifty eggs across two tsars. We explore the w ...