What Is It & What Does It Say??? Help Please

JMOORE

A coworker brought this to work for me to look at because she knows that I collect coins.

Now we all know that it's not a coin but some kind of a "Pin" or "Medal".

She asked me if I could find out any info on it and mostly what it says.




Thanks!!!!!!!

Jim

P.S. There is a very good chance that the photos are "upside down"

0john0

That looks very interesting, I look forward to seeing what meaning people here can give to it.

Askari

Sorry, but it's not from my neck of the woods. Neat-looking, though!

historygeek

It's a police badge. Not sure if it is Nationalist or Communist...

satootoko

You have the pictures right side up!

The character on the front is "Sho", but what it means in the context of this badge is not clear at all. According to the Beautiful Bride one it's 20+ dictionary meanings would be part of the phrase for fire station.

The legend on the back (right to left) is "gun chu kei satsusho". A "gun" (pronounced "goon") is a political subdivision roughly (verrrrry roughly) equivalent to a U.S. county, but there is no current gun in Japan named "Chu". A "Kei satsusho" (pronounced "kay sassho" is a police station.

There is, of course, no way to tell from the piece whether it is actually Japanese or Chinese. If it's Chinese the character meanings, but not their pronunciation, would be the same.

The caligraphy is not particularly instructive as when it was created. All in all, an interesting badge, of indeterminate age.

historygeek

What are those two thing around the main character? To me the look like the Mongol "nine banners"...

In Cantonese the first two characters on the right reads "quan zhong" which could be a place in China or it could be just "village center" or something like that.

JMOORE

The knowledge on these forums is simply amazing. I have never had a question not answered.

Roy, Thank You Very Much

Jim

sumnom

Geek is on the mark.

Reading right to left on the back, it say "XX Police Office." The first two characters are probably a place name but I do not where. Literally translated, the first two characters mean "within the county" so maybe the whole thing means "County Police Office" but that seems odd. I would imagine there would be a place name associated with the office.

I looked up the first two characters in a large character dictionary and found no mention of a place name, only the "within the county" definition. It could be that this is an obscure placename. I also could not find it in my admittedly small dictionary of Japanese place names. There are much larger dictionaries I could consult but I do not have them here.

I think the character on the front means something like "concern". Maybe the police are concerned for public welfare or some such thing but the style of caligraphy is one with which I am not familiar so it I may have misread it.

It is not clear that this medal is Chinese. It could also be from Korea or Japan or maybe a Japanese puppet state like Manchoukuo or the so-called Chinese Provisional Government.

I'll will look around in other sources to see if I can find the first two characters as a place name.

sumnom

I also thought that the fron character might be the first part or the phrase often used for fire-fighting but I do not think that is the water radical (85). I think it might be the heart radical (61).

ColinCMR

<< <i>The knowledge on these forums is simply amazing >>



I totally agree!
Good luck with this mystery!

sumnom

I typed gunchu (the first two characters) into the Japanese yahoo search engine and it seems to be everywhere. I think it just means "in the county." I'll go with "County Police Office." It seems that many here on the darkside have access to various native speakers. I look forward to their comments.

1jester

Does anyone have any idea how old it is? The attaching pin on the reverse seems to indicate it's at least 2 decades old, but that's just a really WAG.

historygeek

Ijester the Chinese used traditional ways of manufacturing up till the 1960 or so. My Grandparents have a pair of scissors that look like they were made at the turn of the century, but are actually quite new.

sumnom

I would guess that it was not made yesterday was made some time during the 20th century. My WAG is 1960's. I am not a pin expert but a play one on the CU fora.

shirohniichan

My guess from the look of the kanji is that it's either Japanese, Taiwanese, or pre-revolutionary Chinese (or perhaps immediately after the revolution). The Chinese simplified characters after the Communist Revolution, so it's unlikely a post 1950's Chinese police badge.

If it's Japanese, it's probably from 1950 or earlier. Police forces in Japan now are at the prefectural or city level, not at the county level. The town I used to live in had a county office until the end of WWII, but after the War authority was restructured so that the county had little importance any more.

It's a long shot, but the "gunchuu" could be an abbreviation for "Central Kohriyama". Kohriyama is a city in Fu-kushima Prefecture, so perhaps the badge is for the Central Kohriyama district. Who knows?

[Edited to add: I can't believe a prefectural name is banned by the censorship software.]

historygeek

I can't believe Fu-kien was censored.

sumnom

Fukien and Fukushima are not words that should be subject to censorship.

toyonakataro

As sumnom guessed, I believe front has something to do with fire fightings. That design on front is quite similar to symbol used by Japanese firemen.
I also searced "gunchu" by yahoo Japan as summon did and found a few place named gunchu(or gunnaka?)

Must be an old pin anyway.

satootoko

<< <i>It's a long shot, but the "gunchuu" could be an abbreviation for "Central Kohriyama". >>

Possible, but I doubt it very much. Koriyama is my Beautiful Bride's home town, and she lived there until the early '50s before she moved to Tokyo where I met her, so I think she would have recognized a Koriyama-related item. Most of our recent trip was spent in Koriyama and surrounding areas of Fukushima-ken.

sumnom

Toyo,

Why would fire fighting be attached to the police office? Are police and fire fighting services attached in Japan?

Also, are you sure the front character has the water radical (85)? Could it be "heart" (61)?



Edited: Sorry for the typo Toyo!

toyonakataro

<< <i> Are police and fire fighting services attached in Japan? >>


Not at least now. But the medal looks very old....please give me a few days to answer. I'll ask some elderly people

toyonakataro

I found an article that in Tokyo, police and fire department was attached until 1948.(I found this article from Tokyo Fire Department site) It's highly possible situation was same in "gunchu"

sumnom

The plot thickens! I look forward to what you find out.

historygeek

I still don't like singing pokemon.

sumnom

?????????????

historygeek

->>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> is an annoying singing pokemon. His special power is "singing", which is actually high pitched two-syllable only God-knows-what noise, that puts enemy pokemon to sleep.

sumnom

I am not in this particular loop.

toyonakataro

I couldn't find a person who knows the history of police/fire department in Japan, but I found a link.
warning...it's written in Japanese
According to the link, Japanese fire departent belonged to police until the end of WW2 and then, the law was established to make fire department independent of police office in 1948.
The medal is old and I won't be surprised if it was made before 1948.

sumnom

Thanks for the link. I find it interesting that the police and fire departments were seperated by the US occupation. I wonder if the US authorities enacted these reforms because of the connection of the local police/fire departments to national (air?) defense under the Ministry of War during the early Showa period.

I think we should consider this case closed. After Toyo's presentation, it seems that this is indeed a pre-1948 county fire department pin.

JMOORE

Once again thanks for the info!!!!!!!!!

Jim