Sg Entry For 133A 9d Stamp

Hello,

in the meantime I own a SG Australia catalog, and it really helps.

But I have a question about the SG 133a. It says:
"die II [...] in pair with die IIB".

SG 133 is die IIB. SG 133a is for the pair.

So logically there must be a SG 133 with die II as a single stamp, not only as a pair.

Why isn't there a SG number for a 133 9d stamp with die II?

My 2018 SG has a 133 and a 133a.

SG 133 is Die IIB. SG 133a is Die II (substituted cliche) in a pair with Die IIB.

Die II is SG 39. See also SG 39c

Hope this helps

You are correct, there should be a separate SG listing for a single die II 9d with CofA watermark and there is not.

The Australian Commonwealth Specialists' Catalogue (ACSC Kangaroos) prices the CofA 9d Die IIB, single Die II stamps and the Die II/IIB pair separately.

Based on the note under SG45b there should be a listing for a single Die II 9d with a Small Multi Wmk too. See SG108.

That's quite an oversight by SG isn't it? I wonder why?

Thank you both.
Yes, the same issue for SG 108.
Fair Dinkum: is there a listing in the ACSC for the SG 108 die II (as a single) as well?

If yes: what is the catalogue price of ACSC for the SG 133 die II and the SG 108 die II?

Stamperix,

The 6th edition (2017) ACSC kangaroos catalogue lists a value of AU$200.00 for each of the Small Multiple Crown watermark 9d die II substitutions and a value of AU$150.00 for each of the CofA watermark die II substitutions.

There are four identifiable substitutions (with characteristic flaws) for each watermark.

Thank you again, this is interesting to know.

So as always, the specialized literature is better. I will see if I will buy more catalogues...
And talking about this: I always wondered if there are other catalogues which list the watermark orientation of the stamps of the colonies (before 1913)?

In SG, they only say, all orientations appear (for example upright and inverted) and it seems they think all are exactly equally common or rare. On the other hand, they know some details :), for example the SG 322 is said to be with upright watermark only, no inverted (why?).

I have hundreds of Australian duplicates to look at (and want to), and for some stamps I find several inverted items, but some stamps not at all. So there must be a more detailed analysis and catalogue system for the watermark orientation or the colonies, is there a catalogue?

The 4th Edition (2004) ACSC Kangaroos and The Early Federal Period provided catalogue values for inverted watermarks on Australian state stamps from 1901-12.

I don't know of any work that provides a comprehensive study of the pre-federation inverted watermarks.

Study of those certainly reveals that some are rarer than others.

Which colony's SG 322 do you refer to, Stamperix?

thank you, so in the colonie's catalogues the watermark orientation is not mentioned, right?

I talked about the Victoria SG 322, but it was only an example that of course, the watermark orientation is something interesting and recorded in most cases. I am pretty new to Australian stamps, so it's kind of strange that there are those Commonwealth rarities for the watermark orientations, but for the colonies, no one cares.

I think this would be a good research topic for an Australian specialist, to search for the colonies' stamps and look which of them has never appeared with inverted watermark. If you don't make a complete statistics out of it, but only a list of unknown stamps, it would even be possible to make it (from the time perspective).

Printing techniques in the Australian colonies, especially in the earlier period, were both primitive and haphazard.

I can only comment on New South Wales, but the watermark on several earlier stamps can be found in four positions (inverted, reversed, inverted reversed and normal). Sideways watermarks are more scarce, and are often listed in SG.

As always, it comes down to obtaining specialist literature if you want to know what's what.

I agree with the comments above re the nature of many of the printings.

I have a lot of detail for the Tasmanian Pictorial Stamps of 1899 - 1913 and there are many common varieties of inverted watermarks, there is however a large range of vertical and horizontal, reversed and even inverted/reversed. Not really covered in much detail in any catalogue and some are scarce/rare.

There are a number of free plating guides available at the Tasmanian Philatelic Society website which contain minimum detail.

Richard

Thank you both, very much.

Yes, this is also my point: Of course the printing was not organized perfectly, and so there are many common watermark orientations. This is also the case for other countries. But of course there are also those stamps which were - for whatever reason - not printed on all orientations, like the mentioned SG 322 Victoria. And if I think about how detailed the research is about the KGV varieties, it appears at least interesting that there is no information at all about the watermark orientation of the colonies. Probably it's too much work though to go through all of the stamps, printer configuration, documentation or letters to see if there are those stamps which don't have (yet) any inverted watermark.

Wouldn't be a certification service be the best source maybe? For US stamps, we have good search functions at the PF and also APEX (not PSE). I will see if I find any for Australian stamps.

Hutson covers as much as could be expected for New South Wales. Like I said, specialist publications have much more information than SG or even Lowe.

Stamperix, I've posted a new topic here:
Watermarks On New South Wales Stamps - Share Your Research

Let's see how we go!

Thank you for the idea with the new topic.
Just two questions (I ask better here not to fill the other topic with that):
- why not the other colonies as well? I just would call it "Australian colonies" or something like that.
- maybe we could make it even much more easy if we only post the stamps where we don't find a certain amount of inverted/sideways watermarks (like 1 in 100) or at all?

(so the research would be more like: "Rare Watermarks on Australian Colonies - share your research")

Then we would have a list at the end with only those stamps which one day perhaps would get an own SG listing. I guess if we list all stamps with all rarity factors, people will maybe lose interest in adding anything, as it's quite a work to count all those watermarks... if we only take those where we have an idea that they could be an exception, it's less work :).

(but after all you can also let it all like you began, just some suggestions)

Stamperix,

I would prefer to have the colonies separate so that it is easier for the collector to search through the results pertaining to their colony of interest.

Victoria has been initiated too - I may add another thread later.

The invitation to post data regardless of ratio found will provide for a better picture of relative rarity, including those that occur but in less numbers than 50/50. e.g it might become apparent that inverted watermarks occur in 10% of stamps of a particular issue in contributors' collections.