✚7880✚ German post WW1 Kyffhauser Warrior League Honour Badge 1st Class armband
Original German Kyffhauser Warrior League Honorary Badge First Class (Ehrenabzeichen) - WW1, NICE CONDITION, INTACT PIN DEVICE - SIZE: cca 39 x 50 mm, the Honorary Badge was worn on the armband, for many years it was thought the Honorary Badge was worn on headgear, this is not correct, based on photographic evidences these awards were worn on the Kyffhauser League armbands.
HISTORY OF THE AWARD:
The Kyffhauser League Honorary Badge (Kyffhäuserbund-Ehrenzeichen) was an award for outstanding membership of the League. There are two classes 2nd Class in silver and 1st Class in gold. Stamped metal construction award with prongs or pin device, size: cca 39 x 50 mm. The Honorary Badge was worn on the armband of the League. The Kyffhäuserbund (Kyffhäuser League) was an umbrella organization for War Veterans' and Reservists' Associations in Germany. It owes its name to the Kyffhäuser Monument (German: Kyffhäuserdenkmal), a memorial built on the summit of the 473 m high Kyffhäuser Mountain near Bad Frankenhausen in the state of Thuringia in central Germany. The Kyffhäuserbund's origins lie in a section of the Deutscher Kriegerbund (German Warrior League) that established a league in 1900 that would unite the formerly scattered German war veterans' associations. Some of these organizations had been already administrating the maintenance of the memorial together. The league was initially named "Kyffhäuserbund der deutschen Landeskriegerverbände" (Kyffhäuser League of the German Countries' Warriors Associations), a name that became later abbreviated to "Kyffhäuserbund". By 1913 this umbrella organization had already 2.8 million war veterans as its members and it had become one of the largest societies in Germany. During the time of the German Empire the Kyffhäuserbund was instrumentalized against the growing social democratic movement in Germany. The difficult circumstances of World War I's postwar years led to a significant shrinking of the veterans' associations and their role. In 1921, during the Weimar Republic, this organization shed its federal structure and centralized itself under a common leadership. Following this step it changed its name to "Deutscher Reichskriegerbund 'Kyffhäuser' e.V." (German Warriors Association 'Kyffhäuser').