Need Help With Ottoman Empire Stamp

I have been slowly expanding to worldwide, and really enjoy all the overprints and designs of the stamps of Turkey. Not to mention some of the crazy perfs.

In this image, I am curious about the middle row, middle stamp. I keep seeing similar stamps and don't get it. I feel like I am missing something obvious. Is it a fake? At first glance this one looks like the Scott A5 with 1869 surcharge, but it's missing a lot of the design and the crescent moon and star and so on are smaller.

Looks OK to me.
Sc#31 2 Piastre Pin Perf.

So... I still don't get it. Your image shows versions of the same stamp, but why so different from stamp to stamp? I don't see that much with other denominations in this design. Over inking? is it just a wide variety of print quality? Excessive plate wear from this particular ink, or maybe greater number of stamps printed?

Beyond my current knowledge.
I have specialists books, however in German, and is laborious to find, then translate pertinent information.
I'll eventually tackle the job.

If one were to speculate, I think it fairly obvious the printing /separation of these issues including paper, was given under telling local circumstances, which affected production /quality.

Turkey was faced with huge competition for services by foreign Post Offices in their country, at one stage having to offer "discounted" postage to try and encourage their country's use.
As late as 1870 ? Turkey still did not have a delivery service, one had to pick up the mail from the Post Office.

Some of our members may have a more studied response, and I'll post in the future should I come across the relevant information.

Hi Ray,

It is all of what you've said & more. The quality of the printing on that particular denomination was horrendously bad, and the range of variation is extremely broad. My view/rationale for that is the ink - that color must've been very unstable & not easy to replicate or maintain quality/consistency over multiple printing runs and/or batches of ink.

Your stamp shows that the perforating process was equally flawed.

While these types of issues appear on all stamps in this series, they seem to be more prevalent on the 2 piastre denomination...

Like Rod is doing, collecting numerous variations of this stamp can be fun!

If I have translated this correctly,
The lower 2/3rds of a sheet of the 2 Gurush, showing perforation via Sewing Machine.

Andreas Birken
Die Briefmarken
2a. Duloz-Plattenfehler.

Thanks for the help, I do appreciate it! I really like the variety in these stamps, including the perfs. It's just hard to find much information. I have been looking for Adolf Passer's "The Stamps of Turkey" or any other references but not finding much.

EDIT: Maybe I need to brush up on my German I haven't used in 30 years or so...

Confirmation :

"Duloz" issue
"Dissatisfied" with the first issue as compared with "the well-executed stamps of other countries",[5] Turkey turned to France for its second issue of postage stamps, following Greece's decision to have its first stamps printed in Paris. Commonly known as the Duloz issue, it was engraved by a Frenchman, Mr. "Duloz", and originally printed by the Poitevin firm in Paris.[7] The engraver has been identified as Pierre Edelestand Stanislas Dulos (1820-1874). Dulos, as his name is correctly spelled, was a highly skilled technical engraver and the inventor of a chemical process to produce recess or relief engraving plates, and engraved many French revenue stamps. The design was apparently prepared by the Turkish Ministry of Finance, but the name of the designer is unknown.[9] The Duloz stamps were issued from 1865 to 1876, although two were overprinted for use in 1881–1882, and continued to be used for some time as the subsequent Empire issue was not valid for domestic postage until 1888 (see below).[10] In 1868, printing plates for the stamps were sent to Constantinople, where the remaining Duloz stamps were printed.[11] Some of the subsequent printings were poorly printed and badly perforated.


Note : As we have been suggested at ONEPS, the name "Dulos" is preferred, rather than the more common "Duloz"

https://wikivisually.com/wiki/Posta...ry_of_Turkey

I have been looking for 3 years.
Don't expect any change from $100 when you find it.

Without plates, the book is available at $75 US

$100 seems to be the going rate for most old in depth stamp reference books. I haven't seen Passer's book at any price. Too bad there aren't more of these books as pdf's yet. I did find it in a few libraries, but not where I have or can get a library card.

I did find something by Andreas Birken on ebay, but the listing is confusing. It's listed as covering postal stationary, which seems wrong or at least is not evident in the German only title. Claims to be in both German and english. Also expensive for what it is... https://www.ebay.com/itm/Ottoman-Em....m4902.l9144

Interesting,
not seen that production before.
$80 Australian.

When I asked the above seller about the Andreas Birken book (which is about postal stationary) he very kindly reminded me that I can borrow books from the APSL.

So I have 5 books requested, including Passer's "The Stamps of Turkey" with plates.

Can someone confirm that the cancel on the first stamp of the last row that ROD shows above is a local postmark of the city HALEB,{present day ALEPPO}, his stamp 0031 ymd297

The second and third letters are LB, so that fits, but the initial letter does not look to me like the H used for Haleb.

Related, this site has some excellent images of Dulos stamps.

http://www.japhila.cz/hof/0268/index0268a.htm

You're leaving me behind, FT.
The Postmark volumes at Isfila are 10 in number and valuable.
I have not been game enough to tackle them (Postmarks) ..as yet.

I save scans when I see a Pmk identified.

Hi floortrader,

Yes, this is an Aleppo postmark.