Help - Asian Stamp? Need To Know Which Country...

I found sheets of this one and I can't figure out where the heck it's from. Any information would be greatly appreciated :}

The 2nd ideogram (ideograph?) from the left in the arc at the top suggests to me the People's Republic of China. Let's see what the experts say.

Donald

illustration of Great Entrance to Emperors Palace China ---
People's Republic of China Revenue Stamp

This is a Korean provincial revenue stamp for Gyeonggi-do. The denomination is 1 Jeon (or if it dates from the Japanese era - unlikely, I think - 1 Sen).

Barefoot lists this as South Korea Municipal Revenue for Kyonggi-do #1 1 won dark grey from c1965 although there's a very similar stamp from Kyonggi-do listed as Korea, Japanese period #7 1 sen purple from c1930.

The value isn't 1 Won, so it must be the Japanese era 1 Sen. The denomination would naturally read '1 Sen' in Japanese, and the Japanese had banned the Korean language at that time. They certainly would not have been issuing revenue stamps worded in Korean.

Incidentally, 'Kyonggi-do' and 'Gyeonggi-do' refer to the same province, around Seoul. They are simply different systems of Romanisation of the same Korean name. 'Gyeonggi-do' appears to be the version prferred by the South Korean government.

Thanks Tony. This stamp seems to be the same design as the Barefoot Japanese-period one but I was put off by the colour. I'm afraid the Barefoot illustration for the later one is terrible (at least in my copy) and it's very hard to make out details.

Nigel, I really sweated over this one: the characters aren't particularly clear. It was some time before the penny (or jeon or won or sen) dropped, and I realised the top inscription was simply 'Stamp duty'. I spent even longer over the secomd character in the bottom inscription, trying to ram it into a connection with 'Kyoto', because that first character is also the first character of 'Kyoto'. To complicate matters, the second character is also the second character of the regional name 'Kinki' for Osaka and Kyoto.

It was only when I despaired, and turned to Wikipedia that I found the answer.

THAAANK YOU! This has been kicking our butts for several months!