Rare 1879-80 Postmarked Venezuela Stamps?

Hey there guys..I was wondering if there were any Venezuela collectors out there who could help me out here on this..I think I may have a rare postmarked stamp from 1879 or maybe the 1880.stamped Maracay..which is a city in North Central Venezuela..in Scotts it states~
In 1879 and in the early part of 1880 there were no regular postage stamps in Venezuela and the stamps inscribled "Escuelas" were permitted to serve for postal as well as revenue purposes.
Postally cancelled copies are extremely rare!
Values quoted are for stamps with cancellations of banks or bussiness houses or with pen cancellations.Copies with pen marks removed are sometimes offered as unused stamps,or may have fraudulent postal cancellations added.
Now have a look at stamp 3,the Yellow or perhaps Orange 50 cent with postmrk from Maracay...that is a postmark isn't it guys?? If so this is a very rare stamp then??
Thank you so much for any help or information anyone can offer

Very easy to create fraudulent cancellations on stamps well over a century old, as all the postal clerks have departed the Room. The "Maraca[ibo]" is misaligned, which is suspicious in itself. These would have to be expertized to get any traction in the trade.

Doug let's just say the cancellations are genuine,can you or perhaps anyone else tell me what the potential auction value could be? Has anyone ever seen a Maracay cancellation from the 1800's?
Here's a few more pics of the stamp

Sorry, no idea. And I read "Maracay" as part of "Maracaibo," the second-largest city in Venezuela. Michel Catalog might cite "used" valuations.

All my used stamps from those 2 series are pen/business cancels. So I don't know if the cancel is genuine or not. But if you look at the face above and below the eye on your stamp, it almost looks like the remnant of a pen cancel.

The Scott catalog does not say that postally cancelled copies are extremely rare. It says they are "extremely scarce", which is not the same thing as "extremely rare".

My 2007 Scott Classic values used on cover stamps at $2000. So I would think that is the upper limit if you had a certified stamp with postal cancel.

Is your stamp yellow or orange? Well, I have both, and the orange stamp should be much darker, while the yellow stamp should be much lighter than what you have. You probably either have a faded/bleached orange stamp, or you have a yellow stamp in which the ink has somehow darkened. However, I have not seen sulfur pollutants affect the yellow stamps in this series -- but I am not an expert on Venezuelan stamps. Perhaps another SCF member has info/examples of yellow color changelings from this stamp series.

Thank you so much for your help Doug..Khj it's hard to be exact on color,I cant see worth a crap these days myself very good anymore...but looks to me from a distance to be yellow if the stamp on lower right of full page of stamps pic is an Orange stamp down there on lower right..if that stamp bottom right corner is orange,than this is certainly yellow I would say.I am going to can again and post a few more pics here directly,,see if I can get larger images

Of course, the scanner and my monitor do not necessarily reproduce colors accurately. And the reality of the matter is, I'm actually very bad when it comes to distinguishing color shades. But normally, a "clean" yellow stamp is usually much less orange than your stamp.

For this 2 series (imperf and perf), all the yellow stamp are a very light yellow.

The orange stamps in these sets, however, vary significantly in darkness of the orange. So you have to compare between shades of the same stamp, and rather than compare the orange of different stamps.

For example, the orange of the 1c imperforate is relatively light, and looks a lot like the color of your 50c perforate. However, the orange of the 50c perforate should be very nice and dark. While your copy is not that dark (you noticed that comparing with the other orange stamps), if it were a clean yellow, it should be much much lighter/brighter. This is why I said it would appear your stamp is either faded/bleached or a yellow color changeling (if that exists for this stamp ink). Then again, maybe your scanner or my monitor is reproducing colors darker than actual?

Better for someone less color-challenged than I to chime in.

My HP Photosmart C6180 all in one has crept up in age on me and I think perhaps it's about time to get a new one
Back to the stamps though,does #22 have a postal cancell as well?
Also would like to know who you guys suggest I get the #61 expertized by and what are the procedures of having a stamp expertized,,what can I expect to have to do and how about the price of having this service?

Has anyone ever had their stamps expertized?

anybody help on this?

UFO, I don't know who would be the appropriate expertizer for this piece. The usual suspects that are widely discussed here are not going to be reliable for an item like this, even if they are willing to do it. Part of the expertizing process is figuring out who would be able to give an opinion worth having (that is, worth paying for).

As far as I'm concerned, the primary reason to expertize is to sell, and if your eventual buyer doesn't recognize the qualifications of your expert, it was not worth it.

If it was me, I'd troll some auction catalogues for this type of material and look for references to expertizers that seem to recur.

(Actually, if it was me, I'd tuck the item away, and save the fees...but that isn't what you asked...)

While not specifically answering your question, this might point you towards a resource that could help, especially if you read Spanish. This is a thread I made on another board about a small lot of classic Venezuela (pictured in the thread) that I purchased locally some years ago. Within the thread there is a link to a Spanish-speaking philatelic board which may be of some use to you.

http://www.stampboards.com/viewtopi...t=+venezuela

The SG Part 20 catalogue prices the 1879 and 1880 Escuelas issues for stamps with "postal cancellations" and only prices the earlier 1871-78 issues for stamps with pen cancellations.

SG may well undervalue them but I wouldn't get too excited about the value.

I don't know much about Venezuelan stamps but I wouldn't have expected a Maracay cancellation to be scarce even in those times given the size of the city now.

Here is the color range to help in the discussion .

Thank you Floor and wow those are beautys!..really think mine is yellow,,it's been in my grandfathers album book for god knows how long and I am willing to bet it's a real cancel..worth expertizing you think floor?Anyone interested in this stamp for there collection?

UFO-----I have to agree with what CJD and NIGELC posted,its nice and of interest and someone who is a collector and is concern with postal cancels would be interested in it .But as a worldwide collector who has hundreds of unusal cancels ,how do you price it, a dollar or two maybe but not something to fight over or bid up to get.