What country do you have the most stamps from?

Which country dominates your stamp collection? When I first started stamp collecting I found a huge lot of Swedish stamps. I have to have over 500 of them! The first ones pictured below have got to be the most fascinating to me. I am not sure you can tell by the picture but they shimmer and have a metallic gloss to them. I wonder if other countries have ones like these because I really love them and want to add more to my collection! The other 2 types of Swedish stamps, the heads and the crowns, also make up a good portion of my Swedish collection. I am not sure they are worth much but it is fun to see all the different versions! Looking forward to seeing what you all have to share!

 

Nice stamps... I have a lot of the crowns and some heads as well.

Most of my collections are US but I have large groupings of stamps from a number of other countries as well. Eastern Europe and South (and Central) Americas mainly.

 

Ireland....probably more than 4,000 (if we count mint and used) or 2,000 if having a stamp mint and used can only be counted once,

In terms of other countries New Zealand and USA....around 700 each.

 

Nice looking stamps. I do have few of those.
My stamps are mostly Philippines stamps that are used.

 

That's so cool. Where did you find all those Swedish stamps and how much did they cost you (if you bought them)?

 

Wow FitzjamesHorse that is an impressive amount of stamps!! I hope one day my collection can get that many! Aside from Sweden and the US all my other countries consist of maybe 20 stamps at the maximum.
queenbellevue I bought the lot of Swedish stamps on ebay a few years ago for I think $10.00. I had just started getting into collecting, and with my Swedish obsession I just could not pass the lot up!

 

Hello Randi, circa dates for that image are as follows.

Regards, James

 

How did you find those? Do you use a specific website? I was getting ready to post some pictures in the other thread! I am still going to because I have a lot more older Swedish stamps I would like to know a little more about. I can't believe that the three crown stamps are that old!

 

He

Hello Randi,
There are several ways to narrow the search. Earlier stamps were often line engraved, most were single colour. Later as printing techniques improved multicolour stamps appeared. If you have a catalogue or if your local library has one it’s quite easy, just flip through the pages. Online catalogues are not always so easy, if you have no estimate of a year you could scan through hundreds of pages until you found your stamp. Another way would be to ‘Google’ it IE. Try ‘Swedish King stamp image’ or ‘Swedish dancers stamp image’. Check through the images and hopefully you’ll find your stamp or one from the series, then ’visit page’ if necessary, then you go to the online catalogue for more detailed information IE. Watermarks, perforations, shades, paper types etc. Another is to try Amazon or Ebay ‘Swedish Tercentenary’ or W.H.U. in the search box remembering to select ‘Stamps’ in the categories box.
Regards, James. Happy hunting.

 

Hello all, In the UK I have a number of Stanley Gibbons, UK & commonwealth catalogues. I didn't pay £80 for them, I went to my local library when they were having their 5 year inventry update and paid £5 instead for the previous issue. It still covered 90% of the stamps in my collection from 1840 to 1985 or thereabouts. To the library it was 3kg of paper that they needed to dispose of.
Regards, James.

 

We have similar 'sales' here... most libraries have what they call "Friends of the library" days where they sell off a lot of their older books. I used to frequent the local places and picked up a number of good used books; at the time I was reading a lot of science fiction. But good point: a lot of SA libraries are going all electronic now and there will be a lot of the paper copies being disposed of...

 

By far and away - US. It helps the total count to have both a mint and used collection & plate blocks & sheets. It would be easier for me to take the scott #'s from 1-5000? and subtract the 150 or so that I'm missing from my primary US collection of singles.

 

Hello, My initial visit to the library (early 90's was for geneology research, I was tracing my family history. In the lobby they had around 10,000 books for sale, I headed for the reference section of about 100+ books and first found the SG - GB and Commonwealth and SG part 21 S-E Asia, found a guide to geneology and a History of East Asian Art (China and Japan) and a similar book? then a few more SG catalogues SG10 and SG19. Total cost was £20 - $30. I left with about 20 pounds weight in books new price about £300 or $450
Regards, James

 

Those are my collecting ideas as well: I have two each used and two each mint plus BUNCHES of loose duplicates... both on and off paper. Starting on the plate blocks and about half-way there. I also have a number of sheets but that is not a collecting interest at this time... came in some collections I bought.

Also collecting State Flags, State Birds, as well as all mint BiCents stamps I can get my hands on... I have about 20 complete sets of State Quarters and Territories (both mints)(ongoing collections of National Parks as they are issued) and will pair them all up one day: coins and stamps. Same with the BiCents: I collect 1876 and 1976 coins of all types to mate up with the stamps.

 

All these are nice looking stamps.

 

Hello all, A friend arrived from England this morning bringing gifts and 2 SG catalogues 17 & 21 and a packet of QV penny lilacs. I had asked my brother to send the books with a packet of about 50-70 penny reds, I think he's colour blind.. I was going to offer some reds as prizes in a competition, I think that will have to wait till later.
The catalogues are available to anyone who needs information SG17 covers China, Taiwan & Tibet (upto 1986) and SG21 covers Bhutan, Cambodia, Indo-China, Indonesia, Laos, Myanmar (Burma), Nepal, Philippines, Thailand, Timor and Vietnam.
It appears that I bought the books in 12.02.1990 for £1 (price on cover £8.50)

My brothers idea of Penny Reds....

Regards, James

 

HaHa... I know what the Penny Reds look like but the lilac photos are nice stamps as well... offer them as a prize. I for one would sign in...

 

Meant to say something about the good looking SG book as well... Stanley Gibbons is the owner of BidStart, where I do a LOT of shopping.

 

HaHa.. several of them have nice dates too.
There will be two in my album, those are my spares and I like the Squared Circle Cancellations.
The reason for offering the reds was
1. I have about 70 of them.
2. I was going to try to offer initials (if available) for the winners. (AA to TL)
James