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Think I’ll kick off this new section by sharing my pride and joy in my French collection. The 3 items I’m most proud of.
Firstly, my Officer of the Legion of Honor, 2nd Empire. I bought it in Paris near the Louvre 6 years ago, paid way too much for it but don’t care, I love it!
LGION%~2.JPG2nd is my Médaille Militaire, also 2nd Empire. Some enamels missing but heh…
Medaille%20Militaire%202eme%20Empire.jpgAnd thirdly, my medal for the Mexican Expedition 1862-63 (by Barre). For those of you who study the history of the French Foreign Legion, you’ll have special interest in this medal. I’m sure you’ve seen likenesses of the ribbon on many Legion emblems.
Expedition%20du%20Mexique%201863.jpgHey François,
Nice start for this new Forum !! Congratulations, these are very desirable. Each of them will certainly be dealt thread by thread in the future, I’m sure.
Congrats again !!Cheers.
Ch.
PS : I can imagine where you bought the Legion d’Honneur, close to the Louvre. It is clearly overpriced in this shop, but there is a fantastic choice and display of French orders and medals of all periods.
PS : I can imagine where you bought the Legion d’Honneur, close to the Louvre. It is clearly overpriced in this shop, but there is a fantastic choice and display of French orders and medals of all periods.
Yeah, right across the rue de Rivoli… You’re correct, the choice of ODMs in there is better than in most museums! But the prices are enough to make you quit collecting! I paid 700 EURO for the LoH and that was in 2003, darn near double its worth! But I didn’t know any better back then… I saw the Imperial crown and just melted… Still, I love it and have no regret so heh…
Think I’ll kick off this new section by sharing my pride and joy in my French collection. The 3 items I’m most proud of.
Firstly, my Officer of the Legion of Honor, 2nd Empire. I bought it in Paris near the Louvre 6 years ago, paid way too much for it but don’t care, I love it!
What does the Crown signfy? I did not know France used the crown on the Legion of Honor.
kevin
The Legion of Honour was created by Napoleon Bonaparte and had the Imperial crown on it from the very start. The Imperial crown was replaced by the Royal crown under Henry IV, then reintroduced under Napoleon III. The Legion of Honor has been without a crown since 1870-71.
Hi Frank,
To be more precise, The Legion d’Honneur has been created by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1802; he was at that time 1st Consul. The first type did not have any crown.
The Imperial regime was instituted in 1804, and consquently, the 2nd type got an imperial crown as for 1806 and kept it until the 1st restauration 1814 (the King of France was Louis XVIII, and he has chosen Henri IV to replace napoleon’s head on the obverse of the medal). The crown was at that time a royal one.
The crown disappeared again when the Second Republic was established (1848), and Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte (future Napoleon III) who was the President of the Republic, reintroduced the crown in 1851-1852, but without the imperial signs (eagles), that came back in 1852 until 1871 (Second Empire).
After 1871 (3rd to 5th Republics), the Legion d’Honneur does not have any crown, royal or imperial…Cheers.
Ch.
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