Fall 2026 Militaria and Aviation Auction
Lot 82:
Description
Full catalog title: CHOICE WWI Prussian Pilot’s Badge, C.E. Juncker Berlin, 800 Silver. Imperial German Prussian Military Pilot’s Badge (Flugzeugfuehrerabzeichen), silver, by C.E. Juncker, Berlin – a hollow-backed, hallmarked aviator’s qualification award of the Fliegertruppe, circa 1914-1918. This lot presents a genuine wartime example of the Prussian M1913 Military Pilot’s Badge, instituted by Kaiser Wilhelm II in 1913 and conferred upon licensed aviators of the Imperial German Fliegertruppe, later reorganized as the Luftstreitkraefte. No individual recipient’s name, unit marking, or award document accompanies the piece; it is offered strictly on its merits as a maker-marked example of the type, with attribution resting on the reverse hallmarks rather than personal provenance. No separate published biography can attach to an unnamed badge of this kind. The Pilot’s Badge stood alongside the Observer’s Badge as one of the two principal aviation qualification devices of Imperial Germany, worn by the men who flew reconnaissance, artillery-spotting, and increasingly combat sorties over the Western and Eastern Fronts between 1914 and 1918. The design carries rich period iconography: an Etrich Taube-style monoplane banks above a stylized rural landscape of hills and farm buildings, all encircled by a wreath combining laurel for victory and oak for martial strength, the whole surmounted by the Prussian Imperial Crown. C.E. Juncker of Berlin, purveyor to the Prussian court and among the most prestigious medal and orders manufacturers of the era, produced badges of this pattern in solid silver for officers and qualified pilots, distinguishing them from the war-substitute zinc and tombak examples that proliferated as the conflict progressed and precious metals were rationed. The badge is of two-piece, hollow-backed silver construction, die-struck with crisp, well-defined relief to the obverse aircraft, landscape, wreath, bow, and crown. The radiating sunburst reverse is clearly stamped
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