Specimen Of 12p Black Victoria

Bonjour I don't see in the Stanley Gibbons, fot the stamp number 4, Colony of Canada, a red surcharge specimen. Avez vous une idée?

These are reproduced and readily available on ebay
https://www.ebay.com/itm/125585581766
Don

Tanks for answer, its forgeries?

As per Don's reply: they are reproductions.

You might argue a forgery would have been intended to pass for the original. A reproduction must not necessarily be intended to pass for the original. But the divide between forgery and reproduction is blurry. It, certainly, is not the genuine stamp.

Hi Antoin,

I understand from your original post that you cannot find a reference for this stamp in your Stanley Gibbons catalogue.

In the Scott/Unitrade Catalogue it exists as Scott 3Pi black, (V) carmine. The 'P' meaning that it is a plate proof and the 'i' meaning it has a vertical specimen overprint in carmine.

The is also a 3Pii black, (D) carmine and 3Piii black (V) green.

There are also many forgeries and reproductions of these, so beware!

- stamporator -

Scott 3Pii


Scott 3Piii

I concur with the above. I have eyed buying one of these many times (basically just to fill the 12d slot in my album - close enough!) but I personally wouldn't touch one without it having a VGG cert.

Antoin - Is it on India paper or India mounted on card?

I have some expertise in these. Your proof looks to be a plate proof on India paper, likely genuine, although there are modern forgeries available in abundance. The red vertical "SPECIMEN." overprint is the commonest format. Yours is extensively re-entered, which is less common to see.

Is the proof mounted on card stock?

Your particular example is worth having expertised,

Attached is a Peter Winter forgery of the stamp. Note it is produced by lithography; you can see the detail is lacking and there are telltale lines bordering the printed area.

Genuine 12d proofs will be sharply printed, with detail as shown in the OP, as one would expect of stamps produced from engraved plates.

The modern fakes are commonly ink jet or laser printer copies, and show pixellation when magnified.

Thank you for your answers.
I don't know Indian Paper; the thickness of the paper is 0.04 mm' (between 0.002 and 0.0025 inch). The printed side is soft. Enlarged to 2400 dots per inch, there is no pixelation. I inherited from my uncle this stamp which he had had for over thirty years.
Expertise is required.

I am surprised nobody has mentioned Antoin's stamp,
is that not a "Re - entry"
Sure looks like it to me.

India paper is typically white and thin (0.002 inch thickness, consistent with yours). It takes ink well and is used to produce the best possible image from the printing plate, flaws and all. Old Bibles were often printed using it.

You are right Rod, one of the two plates is re-entered more than the other. I cannot remember which is which. But yes, has a re-entry of major status.

Sometimes it is overlooked that it is "SPECIMEN." with the dot after it.

Sparks had this block in their last auction. It describes re-entries and layout lines but does not specify a plate number.

Merci rogdcam
Indeed ther is a block of 4 specimen in https://stampauctionnetwork.com/ik/ik461.cfm#2
It is listed in the Unitrade catalog for $2500 and the block of 4 just quadrupled the odds of a single. only. Rsv. $6,200 was not reached.
The rating of No. 3 without the specimen overprint is much higher at £250,000. It looks like many specimen prints have been made
Can someone give me the number of this specimen stamp in the catalog unitrade?