France’s relationship with the monarchy has been notoriously fickle, but that doesn’t mean the French Crown Jewels don’t have pride of place in the Louvre. Housed in the lavishly decorated golden Galerie d’Apollon, they are the remnants of a collection built up over centuries. The gallery was commissioned in the 1660s by Louis XIV, ‘the Sun King’, who chose the name of Apollo, the Greek god of the Sun. Its decoration was not completed until the 1850s, when Delacroix painted a 12-metre-wide ceiling fresco, Apollo Slaying the Serpent Python. The French republican government sold off the majority of the jewels in the 1880s, keeping only the most significant to be displayed at the Galerie d’Apollon, such as the 140-carat Regent diamond and the crowns of Louis XV and Napoleon. Also on display is a collection of hardstone vessels intricately carved from precious minerals such as amethyst, jade and rock crystal. However, one key royal treasure, the 14th-century Sceptre of Charles V, with its immaculate statuette of Charlemagne, is displayed in the Richelieu wing.