The Stamps Of Turkey / Turkiye: On Steiner Pages.

The Catalogues remain as basic permanent work.

Here is the Pricing supplement, updated when, or as need required with substantial price movements.

All prices in Turkish Lira
Add up your millions Michael

Tughras

Thanks Rod and Michael. I just tried to perf them using a digital perf gauge (which is new to me, and I'm still trying to get the hang of!).

Looks like the left stamp is clearly perf 13.5, and the right stamp numbers were all over the place, top=13, bottom=12.8, right=12.4, left=13.

As you can see from the scans, the perfs are pretty rough in some parts. But, my gut feeling is that the left stamp is Sc#23 (perf 13.5; orange red) and the right stamp is Sc#37 perf 12/12.5; vermilion).

What do you think about that?

Michael: I didn't even notice these were "no ray" thanks for pointing that out.

Chris,
I find the best way to measure perforations, is sliding the stamp edge up the sliding scale lines on your perf guage.

You can easily pick out 1 quarter of a unit.

I very rarely employ the guage lines on the edge of the guage, and even then just as a second check.

Early Turkish punctures can be ragged, or even missing, sliding the stamp overcomes this irritation.

Good Luck.

With respect, I tend to disagree with Michael.
I still have them both as Sc#23 (albeit, rough examples)

Argument: The overprint seems to me to be a type lll overprint,
the 1873 stamps had a Type llla overprint.

On the scan below the top stroke is long (Type lll) and the lower arrow points to the two ends nearly meeting (Type lll) in Type llla they are wider apart.

Happy to stand corrected.

Chris,

Tip:
The 1869 stamps, as Michael has pointed out, has <generally> very crisp clean perforations.

Try and get a fine example, then slide the perforations next to your query stamps, see if the perforations match up.

That is another way to establish a correct perf reading.

Rod,
Thanks for the info on the overprint types. Unfortunately my Scott doesn't go into that detail. My brother-in-law just came for a month's visit from Turkey, if I had thought about it at the time, I should have purchased an Isfila catalog and had him hand-carry it to me.

Of course I have a regular perf gauge, but never felt very confidant in distinguishing between 1/2 values so I switched to trying a digital perf gauge.

Rod,

It appears as if Isfila publishes a 2-volume catalog covering 1863-present. The most current one listed on their website is the 2016 version covering up to 2015. I haven't found it for sale anywhere on the Internet other than at Isfila's website here -- price is about AUD$34.



It looks like when they published their catalogs in 2008 and 2009, they published them as a 3-volume set, with 2008's third volume being a specialized catalog for the Toughra stamps and 2009's third volume being a a specialized catalog for the Duloz stamps.





The 2009 catalogs are still available on Isfila's website for about AUD$10. I'd have to do some more digging to find the 2008 version.

Wow...love it when this thread gets jumping - can't keep up!

I'll defer to Rod on the overprint analysis...I never got past the perfs! If they're perf 13, then they are definitely Sc #23s...

Isfila published 3 separate specialized catalogs, in 2008, 2009, & 2010.

None were ever sold separately - you had to buy the 2 volume catalog that they came with. All 3 are small - app. 50-60 pages.

2 are pictured above: In 2008, it was the Tughras. No longer available. (out of print)

2009 was the Duloz. You can still get this if you buy the 2009 catalog. (A bargain as of now! $8.11 + shipping)

2010 was the Empire Series + 1892 Coat of Arms series + Military series. (No longer available)

The 'main' isfila catalog - is 2 volumes. (It was only 1 volume in 2014 - back to 2 volumes in 2016. It does NOT have the detailed Duloz overprint info Rod is talking about - **Chris!** - that was from the specialized Duloz catalog.

What Rod just got was a new / fancy / pricey / luxurious 'classic' 2 volume set, which only goes up to 1922. (Rod having 'millions' at his disposal!) I assume it has all the info from the 3 earlier specialized catalogs - but Rod will have to confirm this - me having not enough 'millions' for this new showpiece item!

I have all 3 of the specialized cats - 2 in hard copy & one on pdf. If anyone feels the need, please just send me a message.

My main Isfila is the 2 volume 2011 version. So I'm waiting for the next iteration - which I hope will be 2018??

Isfila is in full color & both english & turkish. But all prices are in TL. When my 2011 version was published, it was about TL1.5-$1. Now, it is about TL3.8-$1, so none of the pricing in mine means anything. And there are some significant pricing differences between Scott & Isfila. I tend to ignore both, and go with what my brain knows from watching ebay!

More catalog info than anyone ever wanted to hear...

Back to stamps!

One more comment - to one of Rod's recent questions:

Isfila has not published catalogs 'every' year. The latest version available is the 2 volume set (pictured above) which says '2016' but was likely printed in late 2015. Therefore this would be the 'latest' edition - but likely only covering up until mid-2015 at the latest...

The 'millions' comment is no joke to those of us living in the world of unstable currencies!

I remember when they removed 6 '000,000' from the currency. (It was like 2005??) At the time, it was app. TL1,400,000 - $1. Walked around with 100,000,000 in my pocket - feeling poor! They kept printing larger & larger bills - I think the largest got up to 20,000,000? (Maybe 50,000,000??) Calculators were useless...

They dropped the 6 zeros & issued 'new turkish liras' and within a couple years, dropped the 'new' from the currency. Until the 'coup' last year, the TL was somewhat stable. Since then, it has exploded...

Somewhere, I still keep a few 'million' as souvenirs!

Michael,
Just sent you an e-mail

Thank you both, Postmaster, Michael.
That's the catalogues sorted.
The prices seem reasonable enough, I am happy to stay with Scott for the later years, but will still keep an eye out for the Isfila, used.

Michael, the New catalogues blew my budget for 3 months, I saved hard for those. I was extremely fortunate to get hold of them. I am forever indebted to Postmaster.

The downside: The tomes are so beautifully presented it is very hard to use them as I am want.
The old Stanley Gibbons books used to get employed daily, kicked around thumbed through, as a catalogue should.

I find it hard with these new fellows, they demand respect.
I feel like I should be using white cotton gloves.

Didn't find these on previous pages ,so posted my album page with explanation .

Lovely stuff FT.
Have known about these for 10 years, only ever had fuzzy images.
Not seen these for sale, or auctioned anywhere.

Nice scan.
Thanks for sharing.

I got mine in the Cinderella lots of the James Czyl Estate that went up for auction three years ago . The page was typed up with a lot of misinformation . That has been common with many pages I have found out ,believe that was a problem before you could do your own research on the internet .