The star of the Grand Cross of the Order of the Hungarian Holy Crown

05/2008

The Order of the Hungarian Holy Crown was instituted by Regent Miklós Horthy on 3rd March 1943 to confer honour on foreign citizens for their services done for the Hungarian state either in peace or in war. A new decoration was needed at the time because during the course of the Second World War, a growing number of citizens, be they civilians or members of the military, from friendly states were conferred honour, which necessitated the introduction of new orders.

The Order of the Hungarian Holy Crown was created in eight grades; the orders of merit were the grand cross, commander cross with star, commander cross without star, officer's cross and knight's cross; crosses of merit were gold, silver and bronze crosses. The grand cross traditionally implied the grand star. All three grades were conferred in three different formations: for civilians, for military men with war decoration or with war decoration and sword. So it is that the insignias of the order appeared in 30 different shapes, consisting of the three variants of the grand and commander's crosses, and therefore all kinds of merits were well distinguished from the other types. A relatively small number of the variants of insignias are represented in the collections of the National Museum. It is partly due to the fact that the decorations were exclusively given to foreign citizens, and partly to the fact that the order did not live longer than two years. Purchasing the star of the Grand Cross is therefore a very special new acquisition of last year.