Need Help Understanding What Is Going On In History

Apologies, d.; I misunderstood. Geoff hits it on the nose.

Wurttemberg was another German State that kept issuing stamps into the 1920's, although the only stamps issued for the last couple decades or so were official stamps for government use.

I have a Saxony stamp that was issued in 1945. Couldn't locate it in Scott's but did find it online. How does this fit in to these late issuances from German provinces? Jim

Also, I have a Wurttemberg stamp issued in 1948. I guess this and the Saxony stamp in the above post are to do with occupation of that area. Jim

Jim

These were from the French Zone of Occupation after WWII.

Geoff

Actually Saxony was in the Soviet Zone. Germany 1945-1949 was a mish-mash of postal agencies and occupation zones, with Saar, Baden, Wurttemberg and Rheinland-Pfalz (Rheinland Palatinate) in the French Zone, as well as stamps simply with "Zone Francaise" (French Zone) as the country of Issue. The Soviet Zone included upper and lower Saxony, Thuringia, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, and Brandenburg-Berlin, plus a plethora of local issues and overprints, as well as stamps for the entire Soviet Zone (overprinted Sowietesche Besatzung Zone). My apologies for any misspellings. After 1949 it was simplified down to West Germany (Deutsche Bundespost), East Germany (DDR) and Berlin.

Germany has an exceedingly complex philatelic history, and it's only been since 1991 that there has been a single Germany issuing stamps. Prior to that there were always at least 3 German entities issuing stamps at any given time. In this I am of course including old German states, occupations of Germany by other countries, occupations of other countries by Germany, Danzig, Memel, Plebiscites, etc. If in doubt, if it's got German writing on it and isn't from Austria, Liechtenstein or Switzerland, it's probably one of these various German issues.

"If it got German writing on it" it could be from the Colonies also.