Pink Triangle Concentration Camp Prisoner-Identification Badge

Germany: , c. 1937-1945.
.

Cloth badge: ground cloth 9.5 x 12cm, grey/soiled grey-brown/white, bearing an inverted triangle 7.5 x 10cm dyed pink, the dye visible bleeding through to the verso. Old stitch and attachment marks to the edges, light overall soiling consistent with wear. No nationality lettering present.

Beginning in 1937 the SS marked concentration camp prisoners with colour-coded inverted cloth triangles sewn to the uniform, denoting the official grounds for imprisonment. The pink triangle marked prisoners categorised by the SS as homosexual. Prisoners so marked were, by multiple survivor and historical accounts, subject to particularly severe treatment within the camp hierarchy. The symbol was reclaimed from the 1970s onward as a symbol of gay liberation and pride. Surviving examples of the badge are held in institutional collections including the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and the Arolsen Archives; comparatively few are thought to survive outside institutional hands. This example has been stored for a number of decades in the warehouse of London Judaica dealer Jonathan Fishburn (Fishburn Books), and was acquired at Firsts London 2026.

. Very Good Condition.

AU$2,500