#71 Of Cover

hallo, I have sadly to see stamp is broken. the cover very debased?

I think if it was just an issue of a torn stamp you would still have good value in the cover. The problem with your cover is the stamp apparently did not originate on the cover and the original stamp or stamps are gone.

The cover itself is in good shape. Too bad about the stamp. But if authentic this presents as a registered usage in Prussian closed mail. For that I suspect the wax seals are an indication of diplomatic mail usage. Despite the torn stamp the cover presents well and is philatelically interesting in a big way. Because of the stamp the cover should be affordable, with much less financial value than if the stamp were sound. But in terms of interest it has much going for it....

IFF (if and only if)

The stamp originated on the cover. There are a couple of reasons to be suspicious. The main problem is that the stamp is not "tied" to the cover by the cancellation. Moreover, there is a clean spot between the stamp and the name of the addressee that looks suspiciously like a place where another stamp once had been mounted. Are those the marks of perforations I see ascending next to the name "Gruber?"

To authenticate the usage you will need to find out what kind of rate was typical for this combination of markings, and what was usually used to pay that. I cannot help you with that, but there may be others here who can. This would be a good candidate to post at the PhilaMercury site to see what comments might come. With your permission I will do that for you and report what they say. I have some suspicions about it. Let me know if you want me to do that.

[EDIT: Sinclair got his reply up while I was writing, but he and I see it about the same way.]

hm... I agree with that, I don't see the fun of it.

My question to that list would not be, "Is this a genuine use?" (I am sure it is not). I would ask what postage SHOULD have been on this type of cover? What was most typical? What do the markings tell us about when the cover went through the mails?

Background info for what you would need to know about this type of mail.

dittrich I put your cover through Retroreveal and you can clearly see where the original stamps were placed.

the cover to get to manipulate, stamp to got remote-

i have double whammy

Well done, Jenny2U!