German States : Hamburg : Forgeries And Genuine.

Hamburg allied with Lubeck in 1241 to form the
nucleus of the Hanseatic League.
It became a free city in 1510

16 Schilling = 1 mark

Designer C G Hencke
Typography Th G Meissner Hamburg

I do love those early German state issues.

Rod, These are a little more difficult.
1st check both of these for watermarks. If they have watermarks they are real. No Reprints or known forgeries are on watermarked paper. If there is no watermark it does not automatically make them forgeries. a few positions on the sheets occasionally do not have watermarks. But, let's start with that. Let me know and I'll look for my forgery detection sheets for those issues.
Good Luck!

Such cancellations listed, 3 types. This one should be third (lines thicker), no bonus. Does it have watermark?

I looked hard, but I don't think there
is a watermark, they are fairly grungy on the back
part hinges etc.

Second seems forgery. Explanation found here:
http://testberichte.ebay.de/Hamburg...000000991317
cca. 8th. paragraph, under the picture of a 1 1/4 Sch. stamp, and right after you`ll find 2 pictures of 2 1/2 Sch stamps (on the left a forgery, on the rigt an original). It says that if the outer frame - not that of the pictures, but where it should be cut- (Hilfslinie) is very faint, then it`s a forgery. On your second stamp down it seems to be the same fake `Hilfslinie`, luckily the `author` wanted to provide a stamp with large margins.
But I really would like to see other statements and really curios about the forgery detection sheets revstampman mentioned...so please don`t close the case... and maybe I mistranslated something...

Thanks wadmalatz,
I work backwards anyway.
I assume a forgery, and use established knowledge
to prove otherwise.


Ah! yes, I see the `Hilfslinie`.
that is an easy way to check, if it proves correct

errrrr... I`m always learning a bit, using the internet. My wife just showed me the `Google` Translation Toolbar...anyway, a bit of exercise in German is useful...it says: `So pay attention to the wafer-thin line below the yellow paper and ink`. But in this case I guess `Hilfs(help)linie` tells more then `wafer-thin line`.

It has come to my attention that perhaps
some of the "hamburg forgeries" may indeed
be cutouts from a 1931 "mophila" cinderella
produced and sold, to benefit winter relief.

A sheet is shown from the richard witt collection
at Riga Stamps

The "Mophila" reprints can be determined just by looking at the paper. The paper of modern mfg. is nothing like the 100+ year old originals.

These "sheets" are Mine and my Father's hand written notes. Some (of His) go back to the early 1940's when He actively started specializing in Germany.

Hey! great image there Revstampman
I have purloined it of course.

The web in the background
Is that a watermark? or an example of "spargummi"

The 1931 Mophila sheet IS watermarked. It is visible in this scan and it is different from the original.

Great scans revstampman! Rod you be sure if you are taking other people scans that you leave some for the rest of us. :)

Fortunately Jeff,
Hard Disk capacities increase
at the rate I save image data

I am awaiting the petabyte disk.

Hi all,

Here are the genuine copies of the 2 stamps shown in top of this thread:



We can see clearly on first stamp the wavy lines watermark. Stamp's colour is different.

Here are samples of reprints of the second stamp, other shades exists :



No watermark can be seen.
Regards.

Billys.