Victoria Australia

Hi to all,
This is a common enough stamp and I have hundreds of them with different postdates
It has the watermark 33, which is a V over Crown as listed in the Gibbons Australia Catalogue 6th edition 2010.
However, I can not find a mention of the watermark being inverted,
So far I have found two copies.One is postmarked 1904 and the other 1906
Is it common to find the watermark inverted?
Regards
Horamakhet

Have a look at the note on watermark varieties at the beginning of the States listing. It will answer your question.

Gibbons Commonwealth only seems to list sideways watermarks.

There is a note at the beginning of Australia regarding inverted watermarks, to the effect of [the printers didn't pay attention to orientation of paper, so any combination of upright or inverted watermarks are possible, and we couldn't possibly catalogue the variations.] (I'm paraphrasing them.)

It is hard for me to believe that specialists would accept that sort of statement, but I don't have anything more specific.

Also, are you sure it is watermark 33 and not 85?

Thanks tonymacq and cjd

As always the stamp forum has the answer
The watermark looks to me to be 33 but I am no authority on watermarks, so you may be correct.
Regards
Horamakhet

Hi to all
I was talking to a well known Melbourne Stamp Dealer today and I asked about the Victorian stamp pictured. He told me that the inverted watermark is not all that common and he has not seen one for a while.
Interesting statement, so maybe there might be a premium of some sort on the inverted watermark.
Regards
Horamakhet

I think it is typical of catalogs to be vague when they can not put concrete numbers on things. The problem is when you actually find something like this and left with no real answers to the question . I've had simular before and emailed 10 or so specialist in the series and walked away no further ahead than when I started. If you only find 2-3 in a few 100 copies that is a pretty good idea of percentages so I would say it is unique if not rare.

Hi Nitrolures
I am still checking the watermarks, but so far only two, but I still have a few to go through.
Horamakhet

They may be less common, but good luck convincing a buyer to pay more without a catalogue listing to back it up.

Doesn't mean it isn't worth tracking. Especially if any sort of volume of examples pass through your hands.

The 2004 ACSC Kangaroos and the Early Federal Period catalogue lists this stamp for inverted watermark.

Many of the state stamps in the catalogue do have higher catalogue values for inverted watermark.

However, this particular stamp is catalogued at the same price as the normal upright watermark.

The dealer should know better.

The paper was large enough to print two sheets. The first sheet was inserted into the printing device and them sheet was removed, turned and put back into to the printer.

This resulted in equal proportions of upright and inverted watermarks.

The only situation that would create rarity is if different stamps were printed on the one sheet (this was the case with Australian monochrome postage dues, my area of interest, I'm not aware of it being the case with Victorian stamps).

John