Joint Issue with Russia

On the site of Rusmarka is mentioned for October 4th, 2018 a joint issue with Greece :

Joint Issue of the Russian Federation and the Hellenic Republic.
Year of Tourism.
Dmitrov Kremlin

2 stamps, sheet with illustrated margins of 8-15 stamps and a coupon

This issue was foreseen for September 6th but postponed till October 4th.

Would anyone have more info about this joint issue?

Which leads me to another question : does anyone know if the philatelic issue plan of Greece is available online?

Thanks in advance for any information.

1937-1938 joint issue between Greece, Roumania, Turkey and Jougoslavia to commemorate the Balkan Entente*

* not from my collection

Hermes Heads at ParisPhilex

At ParisPhilex which took place from June 7th till June 10th, l'Académie de la Philatélie was notably present with a exposition of rare philatelic items and some were related to our loved Hermes Heads.

First of all there was this presentation :

Matrix

test punch

Indeed a test punch of the ony medaillon, turned to the right and a matrix obtained from the test punch, and since it's a negatif, the head is turned to the left. These were engraved by Désiré-Albert Barre.

Matrix

detail of the matrix

detail of the test punch

test punch

A second piece of high interest was the electrotype in pure copper of the 30 lepta of the Big Hermes Head, with 150 images of the stamp.

It was conceived in 1875 by the Charles Derriey enterprise under the supervision of Désiré-Albert Barre. A complete electrotype contains 300 images and was built of two separate parts of 150.

As said in french : a unique piece !

Due to the lighting present in the big hall and in the exposition room it was not easy to take a picture rendering the design clear and well.

I present all pictures I took and let you appreciate them in fonction of the ligthing.

Thanks a lot Mr. Louis Fanchini for making your acquaintance during the stampshow and showing me these philatelic treasures !

My collection

not my collection ;-)

So how about that collection of mine concerning greek stamps.

Well I have no problem to admit it's a very tiny collection.

As a kid I collected (worldwide) stamps on occasion, so when they came around I kept them.

Not much greek stamps came my way.

Last time when I counted my collection, which took place on october 27th, 1998, I had a total of 48 greek (used) stamps.

Then for 15 years I didn't actively sort out my stamps, put them in stockbooks etc, just put them in boxes, which I opened again in 2012.

part of my collection

I started swapping actively and my collection of greek stamps grew calmly, all the more since I was not focusing especially on greek stamps, just hoping to get some popping up in swaps.

A few years back (must be around 2006), I received a stockbook which contained (amongst others) a collection (about 70 stamps) of greek stamps (thank you Henny !)

So how did the collection evolve?

It counts as of today a total amount of 538 stamps. (without the Hermes stamps showed in earlier post)

the older part of my collection

But, how many greek stamps are issued as of today?

Colnect mentions 4.006 stamps.

My Hellas 2018 catalog ending in 2017 has as last stampnumber 2.985.

Keijo of Stamp Collecting Blog mentions 3.093 stamps (till 2016).

So depending on the total amount of stamps one retains I have about 13,42 % (Colnect) , 18,02 % (Hellas catalog) or 17,39 % (Stamp Collecting Blog).

So how about that difference? Might be a subject for a blogpost the coming weeks, who knows.

more of my collection

A postcard from Greece

Always happy to receive a postcard from Greece, especially when it shows the white walls and blue sea and the greek cats.

Sent : 2018.05.25 (?)

Received : 2018.06.02

Thanks a lot Katia !

Stamp used on the postcard is Hellas n° 2829, autoadhesive stamp issued in July 2014, from a booklet "Visit Santorini" without price indication, but corresponding to the lowest overseas weight category...

https://colnect.com/en/stamps/stamp/503699-Santorini-Tourism-Greece

CV is 3,00 € in used condition. (Hellas 2018)

Europa / CEPT series

Trying to get some order in my collection, I started to range them by series in my stockbook.

Which makes me realise I urgently need a few stockbooks for amongst others my greek stamps.

Anyway, since the new greek Europa stamps were issued recently, I thought it a good idea to give it a start with that series.

When I was a kid I didn't like this series very much, the design was not very fancy, the colours were not very attractive.

Not the most attractive stamps in my humble opinion

But by getting in contact with worldwide swappers and rediscovering this series I started to like this (Europa) series more and more and nowadays I try to get yearly the maximum of stamps postally used on a cover.

I mostly keep the covers as such, sometimes I soak off the stamps and add them to the collection (and I  always scan the cover in question).

You can follow my collection of Europa Covers here.

But for my collection of greek Europa/CEPT stamps I only will take in account those which were postally used and soaked from a cover.

So what do we have?

1st row
Europa CEPT 1972 "Communication" : Hellas n° 1222
Europa CEPT 1974 "Works of Art- sculpture" : Hellas n°1283 & n° 1282

2nd row :
Europa CEPT 1981 "Traditional dances" : Hellas n° 1561
Europa CEPT 2017 "Castles" : Hellas n° 2976 (Castle of Palamidi)

3rd row 
Europa CEPT 2013 "The Postman Van" : Hellas n° 2752 & n° 2753

That issue of 1974 is very nice by the way, just love these sculptures!

So that gives the mighty number of 7 stamps, well almost nothing of course.


I know where I can start looking for...

Have a nice weekend.

About pre-euro stamps and sticker stamps

Just wondering if old (that is pre-euro) stamps are still valid to use as postage on actual covers, postcards, ...

In France, Belgium etc. one can still find pre-euro stamps used as postage which makes for fine covers given the amount of stamps with low face value that have to be used.

So how about Greece?

The Pontus Lyre, 1975 Hellas n° 1333

This stamp is one of the very few mint pre-euro stamps I have in my small collection of greek stamps and is part of the Musical instrument series issued in 1975. (of which I only seem to have this one it seems)

Another item which popped up while sorting out and soaking recently arrived greek stamps.

I have a problem with some to get them off from paper and wondered if it would be sticker stamps. Up till now I didn't encounter any sticker stamps or at least none that would stick to the paper.

But I have real trouble with soaking these ones off :

Are these sticker stamps?

Any of my greek visitors might have the answer?

Thanks in advance.