The truth is within and only you can reveal it 24 Jul 2018 11:50:15pm
Today I received a long wanted first stamp of Crete. I doubt few here have ever seen one so I thought I did give it a show. Issued in 1898, it is much more primitive looking than one would expect. It's a great day when a WW collector adds a number one, especially a scarce one.
As a Crete collector it's very nice indeed to see your new stamp!
Given that it's a handstamped issue there are minor differences from stamp to stamp depending on the pressure and ink applied and I have to say that find it difficult to have complete confidence in any of these stamps.
I have a number of these including several definite forgeries and others I believe to be genuine.
The only potential problem with this one I see is that I'd expect the "20" in the bottom-right corner to be joined towards the top. I wonder if this reflects an early state of the copper handstamp (although only around 3,000 copies were made).
The rest of the details look fine to me so I expect that it's genuine.
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 25 Jul 2018 07:29:13pm
re: Crete No. 1
Nigel, Thanks for your response. No, I did not get a cert with the stamp. Assuming the image in the Scott catalog is genuine, this stamp compares well to it, both in color and
design elements. That said I'm fairly confident that it is legit.
"Assuming the image in the Scott catalog is genuine"
That can be a bad thing when it comes to stamps that are widely counterfeited. I notified Scott last year of a counterfeit stamp that was used as an image in the Iranian listings. I know of a couple other people who also have reported images of counterfeits.
I would, however, trust Nigel's judgement when it comes to Crete.
