Lacking handle, gadrooned and beaded collar, the shaped circular obverse elegantly cut, on a hammered ground, with the standing figures of Mercury and France (Liberty) before attributes of Industry and Scientific Advance, within an inscription and above the date in Roman numerals:

MDCCCXXVII

The first French exhibition of the "products of industry" was organised by Francois de Neufchateau in 1798.  It ran for three days on the Champ de Mars with 110 exhibitors and was designed to promote the glories of French industry rewarding the best exhibits with prizes awarded by a jury.  The idea was taken up with enthusiasm under Napoleon and continued under the Restoration.  Subsequent exhibitions (1801, 1802, 1806, 1919, 1923 and 1827 largely followed the same pattern and were reserved exclusively for French entrants until the era on international exhibitions was begun with the Great Exhibition of 1851 in London closely followed in Paris in 1855.