Need help identifying WW2 button

DiggingSicilia

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Oct 22, 2023
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Equinox 800, Manticore
Anyone recognize this?

IMG_20240913_171200.jpg
Thanks in advance
 

Upvote 5
Is that a word in the lower arched area"
Don in SoCal
It looks like it, it was found by my friend while we were out today. He hasn't gotten it all cleaned up yet. I found a RAF button, normal one. I was hoping it was an escape and evasion version.
IMG_20240913_145541.jpg
 

I don't know what is is, but the eagle looks to be in the style used by the Italian Air Force. I wonder if what looks a bit like a cannon barrel might be a fasces (bundle of rods with an axe) which Italy abandoned as a national symbol after the fall of fascism in 1943.
I agree with @Mackaydon on the 'French Horn', sometimes referred to as 'post horn' and used by various countries as symbolism for postal services. Did Italy have a wartime air postal service? I don't know, but they certainly had a naval one, using an anchor as an emblem on uniform buttons.
 

A fasces is also the name of the vertical image on a reverse of a US Mercury dime; representing authority.
Don in SoCal
PS: And yes, as Red-Coat mentioned, various countries placed an image of the horn on their stamps. The horn was used by postmen (or the postal office) to signal his arrival and departure.
 

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IDK, it's almost like a reverse R.C.A.F bird too but facing different direction
I can't get over how the bird almost has the "dragon" like quality of the militia and American artillery buttons 1812 or civil war- then there's the WW2 German and Italian bird that mimics them as well...
 

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So what appears to be writing is lightning bolts.
This button has plagued me now for weeks! I go back and forth if USA or not- curious if it may belong to a uniform from the 78th lightning band US? I see a few uniform patches with three downward lightning bolts but lightning bolts vary with either communications or electrical etc... It's been driving me bonkers this one!
 

This button has plagued me now for weeks! I go back and forth if USA or not- curious if it may belong to a uniform from the 78th lightning band US? I see a few uniform patches with three downward lightning bolts but lightning bolts vary with either communications or electrical etc... It's been driving me bonkers this one!
It's more than likely Italian. The horn is the European postal symbol. With a fasces under the eagle
 

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