ITALY Napoleon electrotype silver medal
$75.00
ITALY, medal, no date Obverse: a uniface electrotype medal with a military bust R, NAPOLEON EMP. ET ROI, in a beaded ring, on a pinback hanger with a crowned Lis and two oval arms, Reverse: in the middle of the medal is a little silver tube for attaching something, the hanger repeats the obverse motif on the reverse, the medal and ring are silver, the hanger is silvery base metal, medal is 40mm, 47x71mm overall, the silver part is approximately 15g, I think probably 1950s manufacture, Acquired in Italy.XF
1 in stock
Description
Napoleon is one of a very few people in history whose face is recognized all over the world. I mean, you, the reader, someone shows you a picture of Spanish King Alfonso XIII it won’t ring a bell, but you see Napoleon, you know who that is. His portrait being a decorative motif in Europe during the 19th century, and electrotypes being something they made back then, I’m thinking 19th century rather than 20th. But then, again, the style of the hanger is kind of 1950s-60s to me. Maybe it’s a hybrid thing.
Medals, awards, decoration, insignia, documents, equipment, of military, police, private, and irregular military style organizations. We sometimes sell small weapons but we do not sell working firearms. If a thing happens to be military but is hundreds of years old I stop thinking of it as a military thing and start thinking of it as a relic or an antiquity. I suppose that means that “militaria” really starts around the middle of the 19th century or so, when uniforms became normal. Does that seem right to you?
Over the decades I’ve been selling collectibles my market has been about 97% coins, 2% paper money, 1% everything else.
