Merits Medal.

[Taz]

-----------

[reichsrommel]

A nice set of Meritorious Service Medal early version.

[reichsrommel]

The main difference of early type and late type. Left is early, right is late.

Tang Si

[CtahhR]

Here is a guide to some of the variations in the Merits Medal (공로메달 Gong-go Me-dal). This medal is one of the most common of all DPRK awards so it is an easy first item to obtain when starting a DPRK collection. It is also a nice cheap item to start on. There are fakes out there but they are usually the very crudely made Chinese copper "flats" with the typical Chinese 4 sided suspension and Mandarin and not Korean characters on the reverse.

This medal is higher in precedence that all other DPRK medals and can be awarded for both Military and "Civilian" Merit to the state.

To date I have found 8 Variations of this Medal although they may be more. I have had to wait some time to compile this guide as I had to barter very hard to get the Type 1 Medal for a fairer price ($12 down from $150) and just "gather everything together".

There is not a giant difference in the variations of this medal as the design has stayed the same throughout its span. So this guide may not have a mass appeal but it is there for those of you who need it. These Medals are not usually sold with variation or type information so you could easily "accidentally" own variations.

This first type in the "large" type. It is often sold as "Silver" (either deliberate or accidental mistake) but it is in fact copper-nickel. This Type is very easy to spot from other variations as it is around 34mm in diameter (later variations are about 1.5mm smaller). It is also slightly thicker than later variations and is the only variation to have its suspension loop recessed from the front and back.

[CtahhR]

Here is the first variation of the 2nd "small" Type. This is an easy to tell variation as it is rather crude ("Blotchy") in appearance also the first 2 letters of the first cluster is very square.

The number of awarded Merits Medals is unknown but is definitely at very least in the 4-6 million range.

[CtahhR]

This second variation of the "smaller" type of the Merits Medal is allegedly the rarest variant as for some unknown reason it was fashioned out of a two piece construction. All other Merits Medal are single piece construction. The giant tell of this variation is the "gold" wreath on the front is a separate piece and there is a seam where the two pieces meet.

[CtahhR]

This third variation displays a very sharply angled first letter on the reverse. It has a very strong pointed "elbow" akin to a 7.

[CtahhR]

This fifth variation is noticeable by its rounder font and shallower first letter.

[CtahhR]

This sixth variation is noticeable by its slightly finer font.

[CtahhR]

This seventh variation displays slightly finer font once again. This example has been double struck and has had the recipient's name crudely engraved (Which doesn't show up too well on this scan), 종석 (Jongseok) a common Korean given name.