ST vs. RS awarding to non-Japanese

[Claudius]

Hello;

With regards to the awarding of the Rising Sun and the Sacred Treasure, does anyone know how it was determined which would be awarded? Especially to a foreigner?

For a brief moment, I thought the ST wasn't awarded to outsiders, but I know that's not true.

I have seen examples of either being awarded (not both -yet) and I wondered if there was some criteria that can be deduce as to why the RS was given and not the ST. Or vice-versa.

Preference, time-frame, the dignitary/delegation providing it, for a humanitarian or military advisor role, etc.?

Assuming of course all things being equal concerning the proper class award)

[Guest Rick Research]

For imperial era German military recipients, there seems to have been a SLIGHT "edge" giving Sacred Treasures to "technical" sorts of officers while "combatant" arms officers got a Rising Sun. So a paymaster might get ST but an infantry officer would get RS.

Not enough of a data base since haven't studied this, but that's my impression.

[Paul L Murphy]

When awarded to Japanese the Sacred Treasure was normally for long service or sustained merit over a period of time, whereas the Rising Sun tended to be for specific deeds or events. In the military in particular the ST 6th class was given to officers after 15 years and they were promoted in the classes about every five or so years. If you reached colonel you tended to get a 4th class pretty soon after, if you had not already got one. Other ranks were awarded the 8th class after 20 years and also promoted every five years or so.

Not sure on what differentiated things for foreign recipients. I do have examples of the ST to foreigners who lived and worked in Japan for a long time (teachers, bank managers) during the Meiji era and received various grades of the ST. In this case it is clearly being used as a long service award so I suspect that for foreign civilians the criteria were similar as to Japanese. The difficulty is with foreign military recipients. For British recipients I have seen a few cases where the ST was the first Japanese award given and it was followed later by a RS. This would reflect the fact that the ST was the more junior award. As Rick said, it is difficult to draw firm conclusions due to the small sample size.

[Dieter3]

Are there any examples of these award documents with a foreign name on them??

[Claudius]

Thank you to you both!

I find it very informative.

[Paul L Murphy]

Are there any examples of these award documents with a foreign name on them??

Yes there are, I have a number of these in my collection. My avatar is such a document, it is the original certificate for the Rising Sun with Pawlonia Flowers awarded to Lord French, the British Field Marshal. It is probably the best document I have in my Japanese collection.

[Paul L Murphy]

Here is a close up of it, you can see that the naming is in katakana, rather than kanji.

Edited September 28, 2009 by Paul L Murphy

[Dieter3]

That is wonderful!! Thank you for that close-up, very nice indeed!

That one'd be worth a shiny nickel or two!! :cool:

[RichC]

Viewing that document, Mr. Murphy, was indeed a pleasure. Excellent! Thanks for sharing.