The Old Germans

Here we go again. I like wasting my time it seems. So I was digging through some of my old grab bags and pulled out a bunch of my dad's old German stuff just to get a feel for it. I came to the conclusion looking through Scott that unless it is canceled it is pretty much worthless.

Then there is that A11, A16 and A22 variety which pretty much looks all the same with that woman on it with the metal breast plates.

I am sure its a bit like the Australian KGV's in the sense that there are lots of varieties and some of them might be worth something, but most of it isn't. In total I got 18 of them, all canceled, some with heavy cancels.

Then I got a few which are in the A6, A7, A9, and A10 variety. Again, not sure if any of it is worth anything.

Just wondering if you think I should I bother going through any of this more closely or just stick it back in the envelope it came from?

Many thanks as always...

Hard to say...the Germania issues can be a bit frustrating. Plenty of collectors divide them between "Reichspost" and "Deutsches Reich" and call it a day.

I'd say the biggest hurdle will be recognizing war printings, and that comes from looking at a bunch of these. Getting definitive identifications (no pun intended) for a few will help you to start seeing differences. Depending on the particular stamps you have, some of the combinations of the design, color and value will let you be pretty certain about your i.d., and you may be able to use those as a baseline to help sort some of the others.

If you aren't having fun, you can always tuck them away for later.

Thanks Cjd. I appreciate the input. And good idea. I think tucking them away is my best bet for now since it sounds like it is going to be some work. I still got a number of loose ends here and there on other stamps still to identify and check values on. Also, I have another small stack building up of ones I can't find in Scott and want to scan and post to see if people can help with Scott numbers. More mainstream kind of stuff. So maybe once I get through the all the other bits and pieces I will come back to these again. Thanks again Cjd. Good idea.

Hi Marc

In a lot of European philatelic circles the stamps are worth more used than mint. Some consider the mint stamps nothing more than an unused 'label'. Once the stamp was used to pay the postage fee, it was then a bonafide good used stamp. Of course, there are always exceptions to the rule.

The stamp with the metal breast plates are the "Germania" definitives issue and a lot of German collectors specialise on this particular issue. A good source of cancellations can be found on these stamps as well.

Germany has always been a fascinating area for me as well as Belgium.

Chimo

Bujutsu

Keep in mind that the Scott catalog values for used stamps of that era are for genuine postal usage, not favor cancels nor fake cancels. Usually when the used value is italicized, it's a good sign that favor/fake cancels abound for that particular issue. In some cases, the value is italicized because it is for correct period of use cancels.