This Is Why We Need a Bundespruefer for Armenia ...

Click on Image to Magnify

My previous Blog was about the welcome appointment of Stefan Berger as BPP Bundespruefer for Armenia. The above cover is an example of why we need him. It's on offer right now from a major auction house who point to the amazing Inverted Overprint at top right of the cover. This overprint has also excited someone else, who - thinking that the envelope is just a piece of scrap paper -  has scribbled "Inverted" in English at top left. Catalogue numbers have also been scribbled and it might be possible to work out which catalogue was being used when and where.

The cover is an old-fashioned fake. The three 100r overprints are fake and the ERIVAN cancel is a well-known fake showing a date 24 1 21 which would be very, very rare for an Armenian letter. This fake cancel was already known to Tchilingirian and Ashford in the 1950s. 

The envelope is old but I hesitate to date the Cyrillic address - the letter is supposed to be going to Tiflis. There is something about the handwriting I don't like but I can't put my finger on it - apart from the fact that the address seems to have been written in two separate attempts in two different inks.

Two things are interesting. The stamp at bottom left does have what looks like a genuine unframed "Z" overprint in violet - not rare - to which the fake 100r has been added. And at the top right there is a pencilled signature at the bottom left corner of the stamp, done Italian style. What I would like to know is whether this is a genuine expert signature applied by someone who did not know what they were doing or whether it is a faked piece of expertising. 

Added: Stefan Berger points out to e that this cover comes with a 1986 Peter Holcombe certificate which , unfortunately, is simply wrong. The pencilled signature is his when compared with that illustrated at www.filatelia.fi 

Armenia in the Michel catalogue

Here are some thoughts on the Michel listing for Armenia. Your Comments are invited.

It is important to understand that Michel lists only stamps which, on the basis of archival research by C Zakiyan, are known to have been officially authorised. Counter surcharges made for dealers like Serebrakian and Melik Pachaev are excluded. In contrast, the Stanley Gibbons listing – based on the work of Tchilinigirian and Ashford – includes these counter surcharges.

Michel 3 – 28 Framed Z overprints

-          The earlier small type overprints are much scarcer and worth x 5 to x 10 more than the larger sized overprints

-          The earlier small overprints are roughly as common in black and in violet. But the larger overprints are scarcer in violet and are worth about x 2 to x 5 the price of black overprints

-         Michel 3,4,5 and 20 are scarcer than the valuations suggest

-          Large framed Z on 7 rouble imperforate exists and may be an official overprint, since the original handstamps would not have been available for late overprinting.

Michel 29 – 56 Unframed Z overprints

-          For the small Z overprints, violet and black are about as common; but for the large Z overprints, violet is much less common and worth x 2 to x 5 the price of black overprints

Michel 57 – 85 Rouble overprints

-          Violet overprints exist for the 1,3 and 5 rouble; they are scarce and worth maybe x 5 – x 10 the  price of black overprints

-          Violet overprints exist for the 10r on 25 kop but they are rarities

-          The valuations for Michel 65,66,72,73,84 are completely wrong based on a mis-reading of C Zakiyan’s first book. Zakiyan gave REMAINDER numbers for various stamps; Michel thought they were ISSUED numbers. Michel 66 for example is a common stamp worth maybe 15 €, not the 750€ given in Michel.

Michel 86 – 118 Combined Surcharges

-          The combined surcharges with framed Z (Michel 86 – 101) are all much scarcer than the unframed ones; Michel makes no distinction in valuations, though it lists the two types separately (Michel 86 - 101 for framed Z; 102 - 118 for unframed Z). Michel does not separately list stamps where the rouble Monogram has been obscured leaving the underlying Z clearly visible.

In general, framed surcharges are worth x 5 – x 10 their unframed equivalents. Only Michel 100 is quite common.

-          Again, some stamps are hugely overpriced due to the misreading of Zakiyan. This is true of Michel 95,96, 110, 111, 116 and 117. Fort example, Michel 111 is worth about 50 - 75 €uro not the 2200€ given by Michel

Chassepot Issue Ia – Ik

-          Stamps from the Original printing are relatively common, but the low values to 15r are scarcer as is the 70r. The set in ** condition is probably worth  20 – 25€

First Yessayan Michel IIa – II s

-          Stamps from the Original printing are probably worth 1€ each imperforate and 2 – 10 € each perforate. The 25 000 brown perforated is a rarity and worth 500 €. Confusion is created by the common Reprints/Forgeries of all values in both perf and imperf.

Second Yessayan Michel IIIa – IIIr

-          Unoverprinted stamps from the Original printing are scarce for those values which were not issued and worth 50 – 100 € each. They are rarities for the stamps which were issued and worth maybe 200 – 500 € each. Confusion is created by the two series of unofficial Reprints made by Yessayan, none of which were sent to Armenia.

-          It is a specialist task to distinguish the three printings.

Gold Kopeck surcharges Michel 142 – 166

-          In general this is a very good listing though 155a is too low (this is the 25 000 brown perforated)

Yerevan Pictorials Michel IVa – IV k

-          A set of the Original printing is not too difficult to find and 10 or 20 € seems about right; some values exist as remainders and are much more common – for example, the 400r

Manuscript surcharges Michel 167 – 170

-          In general this is a good listing, but the 2 kop surcharge (Michel 169) is a rarity.

Yerevan Pictorials with Overprints Michel 171 – 180

-          It’s very strange that Michel does not provide separate listings for the Metal and Rubber handstamps, nor for the three main colours (red, violet and black). This could be done quite easily. It is correct that the red Rubber overprints are generally scarcer. Red Metal overprints are probably Soviet reprints.

Rare Stamps Re-United

For twenty years, I have been buying and selling stamps of the Russian Civil War period. Some of them are rare - in fact, quite a lot since there are lots of philatelically-inspired varieties of Armenian and Ukrainian overprints each one of which was only produced in small quantities.

How rare is rare? What quantities? Well, sometimes only a single sheet of 50 or 100 was overprinted in such a way as to create an identifiable variety. Sometimes a few sheets.

In some cases, we have Official Numbers - in John Bulat's catalogue, you will find them, for example, for Ministerial tridents, Kherson tridents, Courier Field Post overprints, and CMT overprints. In general, these figures are very suspect, since they were published by the entrepreneurs who would benefit financially from sales of the stamps. More bluntly, it's highly unlikely that the figures are truthful.

There are ways of  estimating numbers independently of official figures. It's obvious if you think about it.

Suppose I have a stamp which I think is rare - one sheet of 50 or 100. Then if I get a second copy of the same stamp, then it should be identifiable as from the same sheet - same shade of stamp, same paper, same gum, same perforation, same centering, same position of a lithographic or typographic overprint. If it's not from the same sheet, then immediately you know that there were at least two sheets of this stamp.

And so it goes on. In some cases, you will find that every stamp you come across is from a different sheet and so the print number keeps on going up.

Then there are the cases where this does not happen. If your second copy of a stamp is clearly from the same sheet as the first copy - but has come to you from a different source - then this increases the probability that there was indeed only one sheet at the beginning. (Maybe there is a statistician out there who can figure this out).

Of course, everything depends on how independent the second stamp is from the first.

Recently, I bought Peter Ashford's collection of Armenian combined surcharges. Included was a pair of stamps with a 10 rouble surcharge over an existing framed Z overprint on a 70 kopeck imperforate stamp. This is a counter- surcharge (a philatelically-inspired surcharge) since the official scheme specified 25 rouble overprints on 70 kopeck stamps - this is what you will find listed in the Michel catalouge based on Christopher Zakiyan's archival researches. You won't find a 10 rouble surcharge listed there, only in the Stanley Gibbons calogue which is based on Tchilingirian and Ashford's researches.

As it happens I already had another pair of the 10 rouble surcharge. I don't know for sure where I got this, but most likely from Dr Ceresa's collection which in turn was based on Tchilingirian's collection (which Ceresa bought at auction). I pulled out my existing pair - and, hey Presto! - the two pairs fit together. The Ashford pair is at the top.

Click on Image to Magnify

Now, in this case, my guess is this: back in the 1950s - over 60 years ago - when Tchilingirian and Ashford were writing Stamps of Armenia they had just one block of 4 of this (rare) variety. They both wanted it in their collection. So they split the block of 4, something they would not normally have done with a postmarked block.

Do you have this stamp in your collection? And is it from the same sheet?

Armenia 1921 First Star Overprints

I am going to work backwards. In April 1922, exactly one year after the Bolsheviks finally obtained power, the Armenian SSR was able to put into circulation two sets of pictorial stamps printed in Constantinople at the Yessayan Printing Works. Christopher Zakiyan credits the design of both sets of stamps (a total of 26 designs!) to the artist, Sarkis Khachaturian / Khachaturyan. 

Back in August 1921 Khachaturian was sent to Constantinople (in the company of one G.Babaian) with Mandates from two Armenian state bodies: NARKOMINDEL [People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs] and NARKOMPOCHTEL[ People's Commissariat of Posts and Telegraphs]. In Constantinople, he must have gone to the Yessayan Works either carrying his art work or to review progress in the production of the pictorial stamps issued in 1922. 

But he was also carrying - for official export sale - 100 sets [series] of 10 stamps - and so was Babaian - of what are known as the "First Star" overprints. In the distressed circumstances of 1921 Armenia, it was no doubt hoped that sale of these stamps would at least  fund his and Babaian's living expenses.

These 2000 newly-overprinted stamps were envisaged as a trial for a potentially larger edition, aimed at the export market but possibly also for internal distribution. Armenian post offices stopped selling stamps in July 1921 and instead accepted payment in cash for letters. But NARKOMPOCHTEL held a large number of stamps left over from the Dashnak period. They made an Inventory of what they had and Zakiyan and Saltikov published it in their 1988 book Post and Postage Stamps of Armenia (see page 99 - it is this list which the Michel catalogue mistakenly uses as a list of quantities issued, leading to completely wrong valuations of several stamps). 

Anyway, the Inventory lists a total of 1 960 588 stamps - all but a handful with Dashnak rouble re-valuations already applied. Well, two million stamps seems way in excess of any likely short-term requirements in Soviet Armenia and there was no obvious reason not to export those surplus to local requirements, as they were or overprinted (yet again)  to signal the arrival of Soviet Armenia.

It was the Bad Guy, Paul Melik-Pachaev, who suggested the latter strategy and, indeed, it was followed - even if never followed to completion. New handstamps were made - two small, two large - and, in addition seven new punches showing just figure of value to be added separately as required. All this information is in the NARKOMPOCHTEL archives studied by Zakiyan and Saltikov. The Council of People's Commissars took an active interest: the project of selling stamps abroad for hard currency looked like a way of funding the desperate needs of the Post and Telegraph Department (reduced to 90 telephones and 32 Morse telegraph devices).

Zakiyan and Saltikov think that more stamps were produced than the 2000 carried to Constantinople, but they do not know how many or in which combinations. But at some point the whole project was abandoned. Maybe it just seemed simpler to accept cash payment for letters until new stamps arrived. Maybe sales of the stamps sent to Constantinople were disappointing. Maybe someone pointed out that the stamps looked ridiculous and totally impracticable for any use. Maybe NARKOMPOCHTEL was becoming suspicious of Melik-Pachaev, based in Tbilisi. The overprint handstamps contain spelling errors (as both Zakiyan & Saltikov and Thcilingirian & Ashford point out). They may have been a gift by Melik-Pachaev to Narkompochtel and he may have had duplicate handstamps made - though I think this unlikely given the fact that the quantity existing of First Star stamps - regardless of whether they are genuine or not - seems very small.

In addition, it seems likely that Meilik-Pachaev became disillusioned with his attempt to work with NARKOMPOCHTEL and proceeded  on his own initiative to produce the outright fakes known as the Second Star set. It seems certain that he was in possession of the Imperial ERIVAN "k" canceller and was able to use that on the Second Star stamps even though he was not in Yerevan. In fact, from Tbilisi he proceeded to Vienna and Leipzig where in 1924 he was convicted by a court of selling fake Armenian stamps (in Moscow, his brother was imprisoned around the same time for the same reason). Here is a September 1923 letter to Leipzig from Baku addressed to Melik-Pachaev [but spelt Pachaian - one of several variants]

There is a clear difference between the status of the First and Second Star stamps. The First Star stamps should be listed in catalogues as trials which had a limited but 100% Official distribution through the emissaries to Constantinople. The Second Star stamps should be mentioned as Bogus but passed off as official issues - and which have been forged. 

__________

Now to the stamps illustrated, all that I have. Only one of these is consistent with the Inventory reproduced in Zakiyan: the 3 kopeck imperforate already has a 3 rouble and Monogram overprint and this is one of the basic stamps listed in the Inventory. HOWEVER the Inventory may have simplified matters: since there was a scheme of overprinting used by the Dashnaks, the Inventory may have counted (for example) all 2 kopeck stamps as 5 rouble stamps even if they had not yet been rouble-ised. In the light of this suggestion, look at the two kopeck stamp above. This already had a genuine unframed Z when overprinted with the new boxed Star. And it has had a new value inserted, "50". Now if this "50" is applied with the punch documented by Zakiyan and Saltikov (page 94) then this must be a stamp originating in Yerevan. The same argument can be readily applied to the 1 rouble (genuine unframed Z, new value "500" applied) and the 3r50 (genuine framed Z, new value "1000" applied). Note the pattern here: if the Dashnak value would have been 5 roubles (as on 2 kopeck\) stamps, then the Soviet revaluation goes to 50 roubles; 50 roubles goes to 500 roubles (on the 1r) and 100 roubles goes to 1000 roubles (on the 3r50)

The 5 kopeck is puzzling because the "5" looks like a Type 2 "5 r" overprint but the "r" is missing. The 1 kopeck could generate another Blog ... 

Postscript added 4 June 2013

I show below all the copies of First Star overprints in the collection of Peter Ashford, sold at auction in May 2013: