Most of the mocking badges were manufactured by ARKANZAS, like this one. Their central figure is the Hungarian private, who teaches the enemy a lesson. Here, he’s tossing the Russian infantry man out of Galicia. “Come on!” The depiction of the enemy, of course, is caricature-like. With a big moustache, a beard, a plate cap that slipped on his eyes. Apparently, he doesn’t like to leave, so he has to be thrown out. Below, the script says we’re in Galicia.
I chose a scene that captures front-line fraternization as background. It does not mean that the two sides spared each other in combat. Rather, I wanted to show that in this war, the two nations did not fuel such personal hatred towards each other as they did later. The Russians and Hungarians were mutually respecting each other. This is nicely shown on the photo, but many contemporary descriptions also confirm this. I think there’s a little bit of that feeling in the badge too. The movement of the outing is firm, but not harsh. We’ll also see another badge and scene where the action is a particularly brutal move. This one’s almost friendly: “Well, that’s it, it’s time to go!”
