Collecting East European awards - WHY?

[new world]

Originally Posted by Dave

I am one that hasn't converted to "other" communist awards yet. I'm not saying they're bad by any means... I had a beautiful Bulgarian group that was about as complete and nice as anything I've had Soviet (save for my HSU groups) but it just wasn't the same for me as Soviet awards. I think much of it has to do with the history of the USSR that I've been fascinated with for years, from the Revolution onwards. Additionally, I never really have summoned the interest in "other" awards just as I was never that attracted to WW2 German awards - they aren't researchable, whereas Soviet awards are.

SO, for me, I can't afford the kind of groups that I used to buy and sell regularly anymore, but I can afford single small pieces to research and I enjoy the Soviet awards that way.

Just my two cents...

Dave

Dave,

If you buy Bulgarian groups to famous people - they certainly can be researched on the internet...

William

[HuliganRS]

That's true for any country.

As long as you can type in the native language, Google will do the rest!

Rusty.

[order of glory]

Although Soviet Medals are my FIRST LOVE, I am interested in expanding to other communist country medals. I see a lot of Bulgarian stuff at online auctions. I am hesitant to buy what I don't know about.

I have thought about a theme for my next medal set, maybe the equivalent medal from all (or most) countries. To get a complete set for a theme I would need to choose a theme that is available, inexpensive, and a clearly definable category that is prevalent in from country to country.

Does anybody have a suggestion?

LREmery

[new world]

Here's a suggestion for a theme:

Collect soldier medals from countries that fought each other during certain war, ie. for WW2 include USSR, Germany, Finland , Japan.

William

[Christophe]

2 ideas :

1. What about mothers medals, crosses, family medals... I think all countries have the equivalent, and generally it is not expensive awards...
Of course, you can also specilaise yourself in the top of the top : the mother heroes (or equivalent...).

2. Agriculture medals. A lot of countries have one (or equivalent).

What do you think ?

Ch.

[Christophe]

Originally Posted by new world

Here's a suggestion for a theme:

Collect soldier medals from countries that fought each other during certain war, ie. for WW2 include USSR, Germany, Finland , Japan.

William

To elaborate on this : and why not medals awarded for combat / merit against the invasion or defense of the homeland ?

Cheers.

Ch.

[order of glory]

These are great collection ideas. I'll do some online auctions querries and some searching.

LR Emery

[Bob]

I think price of soviet items is one reason why some people why people are more and more interested in non-soviet. Aside from that i think there's also the pleasure of feeling your really exploring uncharted territory. Certainly in the Mongolian area we've come from the stone ages of info to a very wide / deep body of info.

Myself, am also interested in Albanian awards and have a pretty good collection and while collecting have been able to find out new things. It also triggered me to return for travels to Albania but with a different, phaleristic eye while visiting museums In both Albanian and Mongolian areas it's difficult to move to the next level of collecting though which really requires research opportunities. For now, in Albanian, I'm focussing more and more on documents which are interesting - among other reasons - because they provide a reason for awarding. Oh, and some of the Albanian awards were manufactured in USSR

Mongolian, well, that's just become an addiction. Havind said that, I don't really focus on types any more and am more and more driven by documented groups (ideally with some possibility of research). In fact, I'd probably be happy to sell 75% of my Mongolia collection if I could trade that in for getting research on the remainign 25%!

[Simon]

The question of aesthetical value of non-Soviet awards has been raised on this thread. Though I have never seen Mongolian orders live, on pics they look beautiful and appear to be of high quality. If you have seen Mongolian decorations, how do you think they compare in terms of aesthetics to Soviet orders?

[deValcourt]

The ones I have (not many and almost all state security or related to it) are markedly vivid in colors other than red and base metal colors. Since the majority of the ones I have were made in Moscow, it goes without saying that the quality is high.

But for eye appeal to the average person, here's a quick anecdote: My parents are visiting my home for the first time since I hung many of the awards I have and my mother wanders into my office where most of my collection is displayed. As she's looking around at all the different displays in silence, when she finally gets to the Mongolian set, she says, "Oh, these are pretty."

She's a retired microbiologist and amateur botanist so she has no idea why I collect the things I do. But I think her brief comment sort of says it all for eye appeal to someone with absolutely no interest in Soviet anything...

Phillip