Do you often consider postage stamps when you receive or send letters? But for collectors, these scraps 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 rarest and most expensive brands in history.
10. Tiflis unique - $ 763.6 thousand
Our list opens with the most expensive stamp in Russia, it is also the first postage stamp issued in our country. It happened in 1857, on the territory of modern Georgia. As the name suggests, the stamp was intended for the city post of the city of Tiflis. It had a face value of 6 kopecks and had no teeth.
Only 5 copies of "Tiflis Unique" have survived to this day.
9. Inverted Jenny - $ 977.5 thousand
Before you is the rarest stamp error in the history of stamps issued in the United States. The aircraft featured on the stamp is a JN-4HM built by Curtiss in the middle of World War I.
A printing error caused the blue vignette - the airplane and the air around it - to be printed upside down, but the red frame that framed this scene was printed correctly.
The Jennies, military biplanes, were modified to carry US government mail. They often crashed. In fact, the very first flight of the American Post Office, which took place on May 15, 1918, ended in disaster. The pilot flew in the wrong direction and crashed in a farm field, ironically, next to property owned by Otto Preger, the airmail official.
8. Pink Mauritius - $ 1 million
Along with its "brother" - the 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" flaunt on the stamp. Moreover, they were officially approved, 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 people of the Middle Kingdom holding the Red Book of Mao Zedong, a symbol of Chinese communism.
Although the overall design of this philatelic jewel is in red, the Taiwan region (right) remains white. Due to this design error, the entire batch of stamps was hastily recalled. It is not known how many stamps survived, but they are definitely extremely rare.
Curiously, the artist Wang Weisheng, who made a mistake, was not repressed.
6. Blue Mauritius - $ 1.1 million
In September 1847, these colored 2p stamps were used to send envelopes with admission tickets to the ball. It was given by Elisabeth Gomme, wife of the governor of the tropical island of Mauritius.No one at this privileged party knew that cheap stamps would one day be worth over a million dollars.
When two Blue Mauritius appeared in the fledgling French philatelist market in 1865, they immediately gained popularity. These unique pieces were the first stamps of "citizenship" of the British Empire, but issued outside the metropolis. Also, there was a mistake in their initial release. Such a combo is just a godsend for collectors, because such stamps are much less common and are valued much more expensive than “unmistakable” stamps.
5. Baden color error - $ 2 million
The most expensive German postage stamp. It is known to collectors all over the world, because it has survived only in 4 copies. It was planned to print these stamps with a denomination of 9 kr 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 cruciers.
4. Swedish unique - $ 2.3 million
It is believed to be the only surviving misprint of the 1855 Three Skilling Banko stamp, which was supposed to be blue-green, but turned out to be yellow. Because of this, one of the rarest postage stamps is called the "Yellow Treskilling".
The last time the curiosity was shown to the public in 2010, at the London Stamp Festival. In the same year, she 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 dream of philatelists is rare for several reasons.
- First of all, due to color error. It was supposed to be released in orange. Instead, in 1859, the stamp was issued in blue.
- Secondly, only two such brands are known today.
- And most importantly, despite the fact that the brand is very old, it is in excellent condition.
On June 10, 2011, the stamp was sold at an auction in Basel, Switzerland.
2. Holy Grail - $ 2.9 million
One of the rarest US stamps, printed in 1868. It shows the profile of Benjamin Franklin, who, although not an American president, was at one time the postmaster of all the North American colonies.
This instance is distinguished by a special type of waffling (the so-called Z-Grill design). This type of pressing was not used for very long, at most a couple of weeks. Short production times are what makes the brand so rare.
The Z-Grill is unique in two ways.
- Firstly, it was the first type of stamp pressing that was launched in 1868 (despite the fact that its name used the last letter of the English alphabet).
- Secondly, with this type of wafering, the ribs are located horizontally, while with other types of pressing - vertically.
1. British Guiana - $ 9.5 million
This 1 cent stamp was auctioned at Sotheby’s in 2014 and was bought by Stuart Weitzman, who participated in the auction by telephone. The sale price was below the auction house's initial estimate of $ 10-20 million - but still a world record. And British Guiana (also called "British Pink Guiana") is still the rarest and most expensive brand in the world. It only exists in 1 copy.
History of the emergence of British Guiana
A series of three stamps was issued on behalf of the postmaster of British Guiana, E. T. E. Dalton, as a contingency reserve until a shipment of stamps arrives from the UK. Two varieties were created: stamps with a denomination of 4 cents and stamps with a denomination of 1 cent.
British Guiana is the only surviving one-cent stamp in the entire 1856 issue.
How British Guiana changed hands
In 1873, the stamp was discovered by a 12-year-old boy among the letters of his uncle. The boy sold the stamp to collector N.R. McKinnon, valuing it at only a few shillings.
Then the McKinnon collection came to the Liverpool merchant Thomas Ridpath, who showed the brand to specialists and learned that he had a fortune in his hands. Ridpat profitably sold British Guiana to the major philatelist Baron Philip von Ferrari.
As time went on, the brand grew in value until the infamous John Eleuther Dupont bought it for $ 935,000 in 1980. In 1997, DuPont was convicted of the murder of Olympian David Schultz and died in custody in 2010. According to Dupont's will, 80 percent of the proceeds from the sale of the brand went to the former wrestler and Olympic medalist Valentin Yordanov and his family members. The rest is dedicated to the Eurasia Pacific Wildlife Conservation Fund.