This little buckle (4cm diameter) was the German equivalent of the midshipman's buckle in the Royal Navy and fulfilled a similar function, namely to hang the dirk from a belt, but in this case a dark blue silk one. As with virtually all of these, there is no maker's mark. This is the second pattern, with the W superimposed on the anchor.

This is the mid-war version, which replaced the gilt aluminium / gilt steel / brass type of the pre-war and early war years. It is virtually mint, with a little rust at the goal post catch on the reverse. Otherwise there is hardly any paint missing from the piece, one of the best examples I have come across. There is no maker mark.

This is a German contract buckle made for the Turkish army from about 1895 onwards, when the German and Austrian arms contracts started replacing British and French ones. The Turkish army continued to wear these buckles into the 1960s.

This is a typical Sturmabteilung buckle of two-piece construction with a gilding metal centre and a brass field and would originally have been worn on a brown leather belt. The Stormtroops were the fighting arm of the Nazi party when it came to disputing control of the streets with the Reds.

The double horse motif could refer to Hamburg or Brunswick, as there is a Party day badge for Hamburg with a very similar double horse motif, while Brunswick also used the horse as a central motif on its coat of arms. These are rare on account of the strong probability that the bulk of them were scrapped for their metal content during WW2.