Historical and Art Medals

Dublin Civic Exhibition, 1914, Executive Committee, a member’s gilt-bronze lapel badge by Hopkins & Hopkins, phoenix on column, 39 x 38mm. Extremely fine and very rare, no other specimens known to the vendor or the cataloguer; with pin back (£40-60)

The Dublin Civic Exhibition, organised by the Civics Institute of Ireland, a pressure group of philanthropic social reformers, was staged between 15 July and 31 August 1914. The exhibition aimed to showcase the various ways by which life in Ireland might be improved in the coming years and was a success, attracting some 9,000 visitors a day, but its message and mission were overshadowed by the outbreak of War with Germany and later the start of the Irish Civil War in 1916