Crete-Real Stamps , Real Cancels And Forgeries, Fake Cancels

new addition to my collection .

Very nice! Thanks for posting these for reference!

k

absolutely

Rather than start a new topic, I'll add this here:

I recently received a few of these, and they pass the initial test of the complete circle. Thoughts?






They look fishy to me.

Hi Cjd,

This one looks ok to me although the perfs are usually much cleaner than this.

When I get home later I'll check whether I can confirm which type it is. If I remember correctly there were 10 types in each setting and there were two settings of the 10 para brown. I like to collect blocks of these to see the type characteristics in relation to each other.

I'd be delighted to check any others if you want to post them. Your scan of the full stamp here is perfect for identification.

I don't agree that the first line of forgeries are from the original printers as the quality is so poor. Surely Grundman & Stangel would have produced much better quality forgeries than these. However, I wouldn't be surprised at all if they were responsible for many of the better quality forgeries.

I have examples of Fournier's forgeries of the early Revolutionary Assembly stamps but I don't remember reading of Fournier forgeries of these. I'd be very interested to see a reference on this. I'll check if there's any discussion on this in Feenstra when I get home.

All the best,

1899 Scott 5 20pa rose. Perf 11 1/2
British Sphere of Administration
Note: Gunman & Stangel in Athens, Greece did the original printing
And the subsequent Forgery illustrated here ;-)

Here's a closeup of the 20pa rose forgery, that in my naivety, I had in my collection.

Hi Cjd,

I'm home now and have checked your 10 pa brown. It is genuine and is Transfer 2, Type 1. The key design flaw matches very nicely a stamp I have in a positional block of 4 types.

In this case the key characteristic is the narrowing of the "square wave" pattern at the bottom edge panel below the first "O" of PROSORINON.

It also has the second characteristic which is a *very* small pimple on the top side of the square wave pattern in the top edge panel above the space between the "A" and "X" of TAXYDROMEION (TACHUDROMEION).

I've checked Feenstra's Crete handbook and he makes no comment about Fournier in relation to forgeries of this issue.

He describes three types of forgery:

1. the "Grundman & Stangel" ones which used the same paper, ink and perforation as the genuine stamps (although using new stones - they are not reprints);

2. broadly similar stamp using using perf 11.25 with smaller holes;

3. the cruder forgeries shown in the first line of forgeries in floortrader's scan.

Nigelc --thanks for posting ,sorry can't respond for a few months. My collection and all records are 1200 miles away in storage with our furniture, waiting for our new home to be build.

nigelc, that's great stuff. I will take you up on your offer, as there are not that many. Enough that it made me suspicious to have them together on one page, but not that many.

nigelc, here are the rest of the browns, numbered. Please don't let this be an imposition. If this was more than you bargained for, just say so...











The lot included equal numbers of 10 blues and 20 reds. I'll hold off on those.

Thanks for looking.

C.

Hi C,

I plan to look at these on Sunday. Please post your blue and red stamps whenever you're ready (and any green ones too). These other colours are sometimes easier to identify.

Here are the blues:

and lastly (sadly, the lot's greens were pilfered before I got to it) the reds:












At least two of these ended up with some detritus in the scan. If it interferes with i.d., don't feel bad about skipping the stamp. If a cleaner scan is useful for any reason as a reference for anyone, pipe up and I'll rescan the messy ones.

nigelc, if you want to pick just one of the colors, or if you get to the point of just giving a thumbs up or down on genuineness, I will be very grateful for anything you are able to provide.