Russia Sg 18-1866-Hor Laid-Yellow Over Black ?

This stamp has been bugging me for a long time.

I did have a series of conversations with Greg Mirsky at Rossica, but never got a final response from him about it one way or the other.

This kind of variety exists on other Russian stamps of the era, so hopefully there are some Russian experts on here that can help.

Maybe I am just not looking at it correctly, but it looks pretty clear to me.

Yellow over black ?.

Dyna,

can you show us at least what you are referring to???

Rein

Sorry I have just edited.
I accidently clicked on the post button before I finished.
Took me a few minutes to figure out how to edit.

Looks like yellow on black.Especialy the center eagle with the
horiz. lines.Yet there may be another reason,perhaps
between the under yellow and the abrased overprinted black, the effect
of yellow showing through is more obvious.Perhaps the black ink was
not prepared as usual...These stamps are notorious for their inks.
If it is a yellow on black ,then it could be a scarce stamp.
Have too check it out with a microscope,can't tell from the photo..

I have looked at it with a cheapo mini 60x microscope.

The yellow appears to me, to be definitely on top of the black.

I will rescan the stamp again at 1200dpi @ 150% and see if that helps.

I will go try and find it now.

Ok I have rescanned, and also added a scan of the reverse to show no bleed seems to have occurred.

Should probably mention. The yellow shift downwards and left, that can be seen at the top, is not what we are discussing. Its the yellow over the black. Visible clearly in the centre and the letters below.

The stamp is not in great condition, as can be seen. But if this is what I hope it is, it could be a very rare stamp.

Of course the other possibility is that its a forgery.

David Feldman auction stamp.Comparitive with your stamp.If your stamp is
a forgery,it is very well done.The thing that I see a bit different are
the horiz. lines in the center which are perfectly thin in your stamp.
There is a color difference also.

Yes I agree on the shade.

I have a page of early russian, and the shades seem to vary quite a lot.
It is lighter than the other copy I have.

Maybe its washed out or faded.

I have the SG part 10 2008. So nothing useful to go by.

Another thing I noticed is the left part of the ornament has a
point downwards.While the point is upwards in the Feldman stamp.

Hmm. Well spotted. Great picture.

I cannot see that much detail on my page as the stamps were scanned in the sheet.

I will dig it out tomorrow and check my other stamps for that point on the ornament. I have several more not shown that are on a variety page so will check them as well.

Ok.

I have dug them out and made a scan of 6 stamps for comparison.

Perf12. Your excellent eyesight has made me look very carefully at these stamps and I have seen a couple of things that may help.

The first two stamps (including the stamp in question) both have a thicker ornament than the stamps in the lower row. Both are pointing down.

The lower stamps all have thinner ornaments and are pointing up like the Feldman stamp.

The second and third stamps both have broken trumpets where they should join the curl. The third stamp is vertical laid, the rest are horizontal.

The watermark is clearly visible on the lower row stamps in a tray without fluid. The first two are not visible in the tray, but show clearly by shining a light through.

What do you think ?.

In this link to confirm if your stamps is the 5th issue..
http://rusphil.com/russian-empire-1...h-issue-1866

Ran out of fluid.

So put the five horizontal laid in my signoscope T2 one at a time, then two together. All the horizontal lines are showing clearly.

The pattern is not so clear on the stamp in question, but lines are clear and look the same size as the other four stamps.

And thanks for the link. That will come in very useful.

Dyna,

I got into discussions like this before! What colour comes first is Obvious, yet impossible:





Yellow over red OR red over yellow!?