Sardinia, Civil Merit and Military Valor Medals, Plate LXXII, 1844

This is an original antique wood engraving, colored by hand, showing Sardinian decorations, most of them on blue watered ribbons. At the top is a pale blue star of feathered rays with a blue center bearing a crowned monogram, ringed by a gold-lettered legend. Below, at left, is a crowned badge with a white cross bordered in red within a green laurel wreath; in the center a blue cross with a white medallion bearing a script monogram, on a white ribbon with blue waved stripes; and at right a crowned gold cross with a crowned monogram over a laurel wreath. A small gold-rimmed disc between the lower medals is lettered for civil merit. At bottom left is a plain gold medal showing a laurel wreath, and at bottom right a pale blue medal with the crowned shield of Savoy, a white cross, between a palm and a laurel branch.

The running head reads "SARDAIGNE." (Sardinia) and the plate number "LXXII." The items are numbered 6 to 11, with the figure 7 printed under both crowned badges. The star is lettered "AL MERITO ED AL VALORE" (for merit and for valor), the small disc 9 "AL MERITO CIVILE 1831" (for civil merit, 1831), and medal 10 "AL VALORE MILITARE." (for military valor).

The plate comes from Ordres de Chevalerie et Marques d'Honneur, published by Auguste Wahlen in Brussels by the Librairie Historique-Artistique, rue de Schaerbeek, 12, in 1844; its half title reads Histoire, costumes, décorations de tous les ordres de chevalerie, et marques d'honneur. Auguste Wahlen was the pen name of the Belgian writer Jean-François-Nicolas Loumyer (1801 to 1875), and the title page lists his own knighthoods in the orders of Prussia, Sweden, Spain, Portugal, Turkey, Hanover, Greece, the Roman States, Saxe-Coburg and Brazil. The plates are relief prints, wood engravings colored by hand with watercolor.

The insignia are set out with generous space on a cream ground, and the plate works well framed on its own or hung with other plates from the same book.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed.