Do you often consider postage stamps when you receive or send letters? But for collectors, these pieces of paper are real treasures, for which it is not a pity to give tens, or even hundreds of thousands of dollars. And the most valuable brands in the world go under the hammer for millions of "evergreen American presidents."
Introducing you top 10 most rare and expensive brands in history.
10. Tiflis unique - $ 763.6 thousand
Our list opens with the most expensive stamp in Russia, it is the first postage stamp issued in our country. It happened in 1857, on the territory of modern Georgia. As the name implies, the brand was intended for the city post office of Tiflis. She had a face value of 6 cents and had no teeth.
Only 5 copies of Tiflis Unique have survived to this day.
9. Inverted Jenny - $ 977.5 thousand
Here is a rare stamp error in the history of stamps issued in the USA. The aircraft depicted on the brand is the JN-4HM, built by Curtiss in the middle of the First World War.
A printing error caused the blue vignette — the plane and the air around it — to be printed upside down, while the red frame surrounding this scene was printed correctly.
The Jenny, military biplanes, have been modified to deliver US government mail. They often crashed. In fact, the very first flight of the US Post Office, which took place on May 15, 1918, ended in disaster. The pilot flew in the wrong direction and crashed on the farmer’s field, ironically, next to the property owned by Otto Preger, the airmail official.
8. Pink Mauritius - $ 1 million.
Along with its "brother" - Blue Mauritius - this very expensive rarity is one of the first brands of the island state of Mauritius. Instead of the words “Post office”, the words “Post Paid” appear on the stamp. Moreover, they were approved officially, and are not a mistake made by the engraver.
7. The whole country is red - $ 1.1 million.
This valuable stamp, issued in 1968, depicts the smiling inhabitants of the Celestial Empire who hold the red book of Mao Zedong - a symbol of Chinese communism.
Although the overall design of this philatelic jewel is made in red, the Taiwan area (right) remains white. Due to this design error, the entire batch of stamps was hastily withdrawn. It is not known how many brands survived, but they are definitely extremely rare.
It is curious that there was no repression against the artist Van Weisheng, who made a mistake.
6. Blue Mauritius - $ 1.1 million
In September 1847, these colored stamps with a face value of 2 pence were used to send envelopes with entrance tickets to the ball. He was given by Elizabeth Gomm, wife of the governor of the tropical island of Mauritius. No one at this privileged party knew that cheap brands would one day cost more than a million dollars.
When in 1865 two “Blue Mauritius” appeared on the fledgling French philatelist market, they immediately gained popularity. These unique copies were the first brands of "citizenship" of the British Empire, but issued outside the metropolis. In addition, an error was made in their initial release. Such a combo is simply a godsend for collectors, because such brands are much less common, and much more valuable than "error-free" brands.
5. Baden color error - $ 2 million.
The most expensive German postage stamp. It is known to collectors all over the world, because it has been preserved in only 4 copies. It was planned to print these stamps with a face value of 9 kreuters in pink, but several sheets turned out to be green. And this color was planned to be used in the manufacture of stamps with a face value of 6 cruisers.
4. Swedish unique - $ 2.3 million
It is considered the only surviving typo of the brand Three Skilling Banks of 1855, which was supposed to be blue-green, and turned yellow. Because of this, one of the rarest postage stamps is called the Yellow Trehskilling.
The last time the curiosity was shown in public in 2010, at the London Brand Festival. In the same year, it was sold at auction in Switzerland. The buyers were a group of people who wished to remain anonymous.
3. Sicilian color error - $ 2.7 million.
This unattainable philatelist dream is rare for several reasons.
- First of all, due to color error. It was assumed that it will be released in orange. Instead, in 1859 the brand was issued in blue.
- Secondly, today only two such brands are known.
- And most importantly, despite the fact that the brand is very old, it is in excellent condition.
June 10, 2011 the brand was sold at auction in Basel, Switzerland.
2. The Holy Grail - $ 2.9 million
One of the rarest stamps of the USA, printed in 1868. It shows the profile of Benjamin Franklin, who, although he was not the American president, was at one time the postmaster of all the North American colonies.
This instance is distinguished by a special type of waffle (the so-called Z-Grill design). This type of pressing has not been used for very long, at most a couple of weeks. A short production time is what makes the brand so rare.
Z-Grill is unique in two ways.
- Firstly, it was the first type of stamp pressing that was put into production in 1868 (despite the fact that the last letter of the English alphabet was used in its name).
- Secondly, with this type of wafer, the ribs are horizontal, while with other types of pressing, vertically.
1. British Guiana - $ 9.5 million
This 1-cent stamp was put up for auction at Sotheby’s in 2014 and was bought by Stuart Weizmann, who participated in the auction by telephone. The selling price was lower than the initial estimate of the auction house - 10-20 million dollars - but still is a world record. And British Guiana (also called “British Pink Guiana”) is to this day the rarest and most expensive brand in the world. It exists in only 1 instance.
The story of the emergence of British Guiana
A series of three stamps was commissioned by the postmaster of British Guiana, E.T. E. E. Dalton, as a reserve for unforeseen circumstances, until a batch of stamps from the UK arrived. Two varieties were created: stamps with a face value of 4 cents and stamps with a face value of 1 cent.
British Guiana is the only surviving one-cent stamp for the entire issue of 1856.
How British Guiana changed hands
In 1873, a stamp was discovered by a 12-year-old boy among the letters of his uncle. The boy sold the brand to collector N.R. McKinnon, evaluating it at just a few shillings.
Then the McKinnon collection came to Liverpool merchant Thomas Ridpat, who showed the brand to specialists and found out that he had a fortune in his hands. Ridpat favorably sold British Guiana to the major philatelist Baron Philip von Ferrari.
Time passed, and the brand grew in price until the infamous John Eleuther Dupont bought it for $ 935,000 in 1980. In 1997, Dupont was convicted of the killing of Olympian David Schultz and died in custody in 2010. According to Dupont's testament, 80 percent of the proceeds from the sale of the brand went to former fighter and Olympic medalist Valentin Yordanov and his family members. The remainder is for the Eurasia Pacific Wildlife Fund.
