Beautiful Lion and Sun

[alex82]

Hello Gentlemen

I killed some Time recently searching around for some Information about this Medal because I'm looking forward to maybe expand my collection with some Persian medals. I only own a 1class breast star, I asked around by some sellers and of course googeld around for some hours. So here is what I found out so far:

The Order of the Lion and the Sun was instituted by Fat’h Ali Shah of the Qajar Dynasty in 1808 to honour foreign officials (later extended to Persians) who had rendered distinguished services to Persia. In 1925, under the

Pahlavi dynasty the Order continued as the Order of Homayoun with new insignia, though based on the Lion and Sun motif. (wikipedia)

There are basically two versions of this medal, one where the lion in the center stands holding a sword and one were he just sits there. The standing Lion as a military award and the sitting lion as civilian award when it comes to the orders that were awarded to the foreigners. The awarding was not really that well structured, so many orders were awarded reverse specially, the ones that were awarded to other Iranians.

These orders came in 3 different ray colors, black, red and green. The black was used at state and official funerals, the red was used for official celebration weddings and births of royal family children and the green

for all other occasions. Sometimes you see also a Order with yellow rays, this is just the foundation for the Green ones, the few yellows that you see were either unfinished

orders or repaired and re-enameled. There are also a few unofficial ones that were made privately.

The biggest question mark for me is still how to date them or at least narrow the time frame down????

Also pinpointing where it was manufactured puzzles me, since there where many countries involved (Besides in Persia it was made of: France, Germany, Belgium, Russia)??????

the only clue I have here is that the pieces manufactured in Germany have the word "Silber" (German for Silver) engraved on the backside.

I would love to see your lion and sun orders an would be happy If anyone can attach some more knowledge or maybe correct mine.

[alex82]

I start with my piece, which I belief to be manufactured in Germany...

[Ulsterman]

There've been a couple of JOMSA articles on this order over the years.

Off the top of my head I seem to recall that the order was made in France and Russia by jewelers.

[alex82]

the backside withe the word German "Silber" engraved in the clip...

[James Hoard]

Hello Alex,

The Order of the Lion and the Sun was instituted by Fat'h Ali Shah of the Qajar Dynasty in 1808 to honour foreign officials (later extended to Persians) who had rendered distinguished services to Persia. In 1925, under the

Pahlavi dynasty the Order continued as the Order of Homayoun with new insignia, though based on the Lion and Sun motif. (wikipedia)

That seems to be a little splash of the usual wikipedia eye-wash. There is no connection between the two orders at all. The Humayun was an entirely new order.

The Lion and Sun is a general national symbol of Iran and appears on all sorts of medals and devices. Just because they happen to do so does not mean they have any connection with the famous Qajar order. It usually means that the dealer may have heard of the L&S Order but hasn't got a clue as to what he has, so labels it as the Order of the L&S.

There are basically two versions of this medal, one where the lion in the center stands holding a sword and one were he just sits there. The standing Lion as a military award and the sitting lion as civilian award when it comes to the orders that were awarded to the foreigners. The awarding was not really that well structured, so many orders were awarded reverse specially, the ones that were awarded to other Iranians.

It should also be noted that in the civil division with reclining lion the face of the sun should be a female face. In the military division with the standing lion & sword the face is male.

These orders came in 3 different ray colors, black, red and green. The black was used at state and official funerals, the red was used for official celebration weddings and births of royal family children and the green

for all other occasions.

What is the source for this information? I have not seen this before and it sounds a little far-fetched. All the Iranian rescipients could not possibly have had three sets of insignia to wear on the different days. With the size of the Qajar Royal family and the fact that the men could marry as many wives as they liked, probably meant there were funerals, weddings and marriages on every day of the week.

The biggest question mark for me is still how to date them or at least narrow the time frame down????

Before 1856 the insignia was jewelled with different kinds of jewels depending on the division. 1856-1872 still a complicated system of classes and grades but the insignia were produced in polished silver; the lion having a small Qajar crown above (though this did not appear in insignia manufactured abroad). After 1872 simplified to five classes, the division between foreigners and nationals ceased and the small Qajar crosn above the L&S device no-longer appeared.

Cheers

James

[alex82]

Hello James

Thank you very much for your answer! Like I said, it is so hard to find any good Information about this order and I'm very happy for your add!

Your right, the lion and sun motif appears on a lot of things in Iran, even today, I visited Tehran two years ago and it is omnipresent like "Garuda" Thailand.

Thanks for the info about the face, I didn't knew that.

About the colors:

I asked a well known seller who claim Persian Orders as this specialty. I thought exactly the same thing how could they have 3 versions of this medal? If that is so we would see probably as many black and red orders as we see the green one. The fact about the yellow one could be truth. But I will ask again maybe he can explain his theories?

What do you think about, that most German made medals have the word "silber" engraved? this is my own thought after comparing a lot of different medals.

So thank you again for your help, I hope we can gather more knowledge or good pictures on this...

cheers

a l e x

PS: I will contact the author of the wikipedia article when I have more good information about this, maybe he can correct/expand his article...

[alex82]

Hello James

Thank you very much for your answer! Like I said, it is so hard to find any good Information about this order and I'm very happy for your add!

Your right, the lion and sun motif appears on a lot of things in Iran, even today, I visited Tehran two years ago and it is omnipresent like "Garuda" Thailand.

Thanks for the info about the face, I didn't knew that.

About the colors:

I asked a well known seller who claim Persian Orders as this specialty. I thought exactly the same thing how could they have 3 versions of this medal? If that is so we would see probably as many black and red orders as we see the green one. The fact about the yellow one could be truth. But I will ask again maybe he can explain his theories?

What do you think about, that most German made medals have the word "silber" engraved? this is my own thought after comparing a lot of different medals.

So thank you again for your help, I hope we can gather more knowledge or good pictures on this...

cheers

a l e x

PS: I will contact the author of the wikipedia article when I have more good information about this, maybe he can correct/expand his article...

[Guest IMHF]

Very Very Nice:

Lorenzo

[alex82]

just found this interesting site: http://www.qajarpages.org/qajorders.html

[Guest IMHF]

just found this interesting site: http://www.qajarpage.../qajorders.html

Najafcoins has a large collection of Orders from Iran..

Check them out

Lorenzo

[James Hoard]

Najafcoins has a large collection of Orders from Iran..

Check them out

Lorenzo

Very true, but one has to be careful there because some of the decorations on offer are fakes.

For example, one set of insignia for offer is labelled "Iran Ghajar Order of Moghadas, Ghajar era's rarest order, Grand Cross Set with original Sash, Impossible Set to find". Of course it is impossible to find, because such a decoration does not exist. This set of insignia is a complete fantasy. There was no “Ghajar Order of Moghadas”.

The Nishan-i-Moqaddas (or The Sacred Decoration), was third class of the three class decoration known as the Nishan-i-Agdas (The Most Sacred Decoration), the first class having two grades. All classes came only as large breast decorations and all heavily bejewelled, the amount and value of jewels denoting the classes. No enamelled badges or breast stars for any grade.

Najafcoins have some of the lower grades of the actual order for sale lower down the page, but they have made a complete hash of identifying them by nonsensical labels such as “Order of the Lion and Sun, Military Division, superior grade of Aghdas (the most sacred), gold and diamond set badge”, etc. Indeed, all the different Qajar orders seem to be incorrectly labelled as Lion and Sun something or other.

Cheers

James