Belgium Color Issues

[clif]

I purchased a stockbook full of Belgium early issues ... hoping to tease out a few for my album spaces and maybe put together some spare sets for trade etc ... I know of course that many countries have color varieties for these early common issues. Here are a couple from Belgium ... I've heard the reds and purples are often the worst ...

Scott # 151 and 151a, my Minkus only has one space for these ...

[clif]

and #114 described as red-violet

[clif]

and while we are on the subject of Belgium ... does anybody know of a reference (online preferred) to the postmarks and maybe a list of stations/post offices? I have many duplicates that appear to have been collected solely for the postmarks ...

[clif]

[clif]

[clif]

[Butterfly]

clif, I hadn't really looked carefully at these before, but now, getting out my Michel catalog, I see a lot of varieties not described by the Scott classic catalog.
#114 has two varieties which are not only slightly different in color but also differently engraved. The stamp on the right is a new engraving first issued in 1922

[Butterfly]

OOPS, I see Scott does mention the varieties briefly in a note below the listing.

[Butterfly]

For the 151 and 151a any stamp with a cancel before the first of march 1923 will be the 151 magenta. I would guess the one in the middle is a 151.

[clif]

sigh ... I see that note now too ... very interesting

[clif]

I've had a lot more trouble sorting out the early issues of Belgium than I did Austria (which are the only two European countries I've delved into the early issues very deeply so far). Interesting but frustrating ... I'm having trouble with the 1c green/gray-green/olive-green/gray stamps .. Scott #'s 28, 40, 49, & 50 as well as the 10c greens #'s 32 & 43

pics coming

[Butterfly]

For color comparison, here is what I have.

[mourningdoves]

Clif,

I recently joined something called the Belgian Philatelic Study Circle - and by "recently", I got my first issue of their journal about nine hours ago. Some of the people there are very involved in postmarks. I did learn that the city of Ypres has at least four different spellings; many Belgian cities have two, for the two languages, but some of the spellings weren't standardized until the early 1900s, and even after that, variants (like "Iepres", which looks vaguely pharmaceutical to me) persisted. So going through cancellations on early Belgian stamps can be pretty exciting.

Much to my amazement, I also found a Michelin map of Benelux right here in Connecticut, and one of these {days/months/decades} I'll scan the salient parts and add them to my album.

You'll want to scope out Belgian Stamps On Line, which is a digitized version of the OBP/COB catalog. The site isn't that intuitive, but with a little patience you'll find a ridiculous amount of information there.