Ottoman Empire, Order of the Crescent, K.C., Knight’s breast badge, gold and green enamel, 43mm diameter, with integral loop and gold rings for suspension, unusually fine quality, enamel chipped on obverse between rays of the star, otherwise nearly extremely fine and very rare £4000-5000

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The Orders and Decorations of General Sir Tomkyns Hilgrove Turner, G.C.H., K.C..

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Nicholas Carlisle, in A Concise Account of the Several Foreign Orders of Knighthood, London 1839, lists Turner, along with Vice-Admiral Nelson, Lieutenant-General Hutchinson, Lord Keith, the Earl of Elgin, etc., as one of the fifteen recipients of the ‘Superior Class’ of the Order of the Crescent with the following entry:

‘General Sir Hilgrove Turner, G.C.H., Knight of the Imperial Russian Order of St Anne, of the first Class, Knight of the Imperial Ottoman Order of The Crescent, and late Governor of Bermuda, “by verbal permission of His Royal Highness The Prince Regent,” afterwards George the Fourth.

It is to the firmness and decision of the gallant Officer, that England is indebted for the celebrated Trilinguar Inscription, discovered at Rosetta, a Fac-simile and copies of which were extensively circulated by The Society of Antiquaries of London. This famous stone now forms a prominent feature in the Hall of Egyptian Antiquities at The British Museum. It was styled “The Gem of Antiquity” by the French, as being the Key to the Hierohlyphick language.’