Thursday, December 18, 2014

More new handstamp types from Tiflis Vokzal

Well, sometimes eBay just exceeds all expectations. You will recall that I wrote about new, unrecorded types of Georgia's handstamp surcharges of 1923 that seemed to be used only from Tiflis Vokzal. Ceresa had already identified a 10.000 handstamp, and the late Peter Ashford had found an 80.000 handstamp, with a 15.000 handstamp added by me. All are characterized by a wide space between the last zero and the word "man" so this seemed to be a Tiflis Vokzal "house style". The question was if there were also Tiflis Vokzal types of the other two values, 20.000 and 40.000.
Cue eBay!
This is a loose stamp that turned up on eBay. Note the postmark! Here's a close-up of the handstamp:
Sure enough, an unrecorded type with wide space between the last zero and the word "man". To add further glee to what was actually a really good eBay week, the same seller also sold me this stamp:
NOT Tiflis Vokzal but the Tiflis-Dzhulfa TPO serial "zh" The handstamp?
Wide space between last zero and "man"... So I'm going to assume this is the fifth value of this group of handstamp types, since the link with Tiflis railway station is reasonably clear.
Who knew? Frankly, it makes me wonder what else is lurking in the (by now ridiculously large) number of Georgian handstamp issues I haven't looked at yet...

LATE UPDATE. As an illustration that I really should take a better look at the stamps I already have, it turned out that my hoard of used 20.000 stamps also contained a example of the Tiflis Vokzal type: