The oldest stamps in the world

No, not a postage stamp, but a stamp used for official documents. King William III (married to Queen Anne of Great Britain) had introduced tax measures for all kinds of services and products. To collect the tax, special stamps were manufactured that had to press the amount due into the document, a so-called dry stamp. As an example, a legacy dated October 2, 1829, on which a tax stamp worth 6 pence was pressed containing the text 'receipt'. There are many dozens of different dry stamps like this that continued to be used for a very long time. Two more examples: one with three imprinted values ​​of 6 pence and one with the value of 2 pounds, an enormous sum in the 18th and 19th centuries. Imprinting the tax stamps was only possible if the document was made of paper or paper-like material. However, many documents were drawn up on parchment, in which case imprinting was not possible. To nevertheless authenticate those documents with one or more tax stamps, these were imprinted onto separate sheets of paper, usually colored blue, cut out, and attached to the parchment with glue. The oldest parchment in my collection dates from 1706. A blue label is pasted onto it. However, a metal strip, a kind of staple, is also visible in the middle of the label. That served a purpose. The blue label, pasted onto the document and provided with the strip that was punched straight through the label and the parchment. Subsequently, the label was provided with the pressed tax stamp. Why that staple? People were afraid that the blue label with the pressed stamp value might fall off the document because the glue came loose, but also because the label could be removed and reused! As an additional measure, a seal depicting the monogram of the reigning monarch was affixed to the back of the document, over the bent metal strips. On January 1, 1701, the use of monogram seals as security seals for tax stamps was introduced. This was done with an announcement in the newspapers. The following was published in the London Gazette: “The officials responsible for the collection of taxes on sealed parchment and paper are hereby informed of the following. To prevent frequent fraud with the aforementioned tax collections, henceforth all seals affixed to parchment, as well as the values ​​of forty shillings and five shillings on paper, currently available at the Head Office, must be additionally secured by means of a metal strip by pressing it through the imprint. A printed monogram seal must be affixed to the reverse (over the metal strip)”. As an example, the monogram of Queen Anne as a brooch and executed as a drawing on a monogram stamp. British collectors call these types of stamps: Cypher stamps. Later monogram stamps were printed with letters alongside the monogram, such as GR 2, which stands for King George II. GR 3 is King George III. GR 4 is King George IV. A fine document in my collection is a sworn statement with an attached wax seal in a paper sleeve. An image identical to the image on the wax seal is pressed into that paper sleeve. Originating from the Archbishop of Canterbury, the statement is dated 8 December 1768 and bears two impressions of tax stamps of five shillings each. On the reverse, a monogram seal of King George III. Figures or numbers can be found in the upper left or right corner. These figures indicate the position of the stamp in the printed sheet. Most sheets consisted of 320 stamps, later also in sheets of 240 stamps. Sometimes the three-digit numbers are distributed between the upper left and right corners. In 1865, the figures were replaced by letters. As the examples show on the monogram stamps from the Queen Victoria era, a new design emerged in which the background was filled with a kind of grid. First with letters, then without letters and printed in black-blue. And finally, the stamps were also issued in perforated sheets with the monogram of King Edward VI. Just like a postage stamp! From 1909 onwards, the use of monogram stamps steadily declined and was abolished in 1921.