What Is This Discoloration & Is There A Fix?

Hi,

Please see the scan of the 1d penny red.


You will notice a brownish discoloration is the two upper corners and the lower left corner. The stamp is affixed to a very old quadrille page with a hinge.
What is this discoloration and is there a way to correct this without damaging the stamp? Does the stamp just need a bath in water, or maybe diluted hydrogen peroxide? Or, is it permanent?

Thanks in advance,

Larry

(fyi, the stamp is a 1d penny plate XI, state 1)

Larry, I for one would take the stamp(s) off that paper immediately if not sooner. It may be the cause of the stamps' discoloration. And I think carefully applied hydrogen peroxide might get rid of the oxidation.

Peter

I'd suggest it is perfectly good stamp and the slight discoloration is due to the ink spreading especially in the non-blued areas.
As it is an important quality stamp with really good value, it might not be appropriate to use any chemicals but, as suggested, it would benefit from being removed from the old page.

Thanks to you both. The stamps have been removed from the pages and the hinges have also been removed, soaked briefly in water.

I have not been sure of what this discoloration is and am very concerned about the use of chemicals, but the discoloration does annoy me. I may do a test as I am loath to play around with these. This one is one of around 150 from plate XI.

-Larry

A washing might freshen the stamp a bit. A couple of drops of dishwashing soap in a tub of water is fine for these. Penny reds do not have fugitive inks.

However, the colors at the corners are, as mentioned above, from the printing process. After they rocked the image into the plate with the transfer roller, they would burnish the bits of steel that were raised around the image. If the went a bit too far, the resulting depressions would hold some ink that would be printed. This stamp has a more extreme version of those blurs.
Chip



edited to replace scan - the last one was just too ugly