Album Weeds – Cyprus

English stamps with CYPRUS overprint

Genuine

The following is the complete set:

• 
1/2d., rose, script watermark, “halfpenny”, plates 12, 15 & 19.
• 1d., red, letters in all corners, Crown watermark, plates 174, 181, 184, 193, 196, 201, 205, 208, 215, 216, 217, 218 & 220.
• 2 1/2d., pink, Orb watermark, plates 14 & 15.
• 4d., pale green, Garter watermark, plate 16.
• 6d., grey, Rose-spray watermark, plate 16.
• 
1s., green, Rose-spray watermark, plate 13.
• 
1d., brown, newsband.
30 paras, surcharged on the 1d., red, plates 201, 216, 217 & 220.
• 1/2d., provisional, surcharged in three widths of type, on the 1d., red.

The CYPRUS surcharge is in block letters, millimeters from the outside of the C to the outside of the S, and a shade over millimeters in height. The open ends of the C are cut off perfectly horizontally; and the said C is no thicker than the other letters.

• Surcharge 16 to 16 1/2 mm. on plates 201, 216 & 218.
• Surcharge 18 mm. on plates 174, 181, 201, 205, 208, 215, 216, 217, 218 & 220.
• Surcharge 13 mm. on plates 201, 205, 215, 217 & 218.

First Forgery

The CYPRUS surcharge is exactly the same height and width as the genuine; which makes this an exceedingly dangerous forgery. The C seems decidedly thicker than the rest of the letters, and its open ends are cut off slantingly, or sometimes rounded. I am sorry there are no better tests. Certainly the Y gives one the impression of being higher than the P, but this is more in appearance than in reality.

Second Forgery

This surcharge is much too small, being only 13 millimeters in length, and the letters 2 millimeters high.

Third Forgery

This surcharge is just as much too large; being 20 millimeters in length, and the letters 4 millimeters high, though the Y is decidedly taller than this.

It will, of course, be understood that the above forgeries are simply forged surcharges struck on genuine stamps. I have seen no unused ones, all being cancelled with (of course) English postmarks. Sometimes it is easy to see that the surcharge is struck on the top of the postmark, but this test is, as a rule, not to be depended on; as, when the postmark is faint, it is almost impossible to say whether it or the surcharge was struck first.

Postmarks

Genuine.—Many of the cancelled copies that I have come across were obliterated with a circle, containing LARNACA, with date, etc., and the circle made into a sort of square, by the addition of sets of short lines at four equally distant points outside the circle. These sets of lines each consist of three lines, of graduated length, parallel to the curve of the circle, with a little dark triangle outside of all to finish off. The same cancellation, or very nearly the same, is to be seen on the stamps of Jamaica. It is illustrated in 67. Others have 54, containing the numbers 942 or 969.

Forged.—These are simply ordinary English postmarks of various kinds.

From: ‘Album Weeds’, 3rd edition by R. B. Eareé. 1906