Petroleum Stamps of the World

Some Terms Useful for Petroleum Stamp Collecting
(stamps are not all shown to same scale)

Perforate postage stamp — a stamp issued for postal use
and surrounded by holes (perforations) that
facilitate separation of stamps

Imperforate postage stamp — a stamp issued for postal use
but lacking perforations between stamps, either intentionally
or due to an error in production.

Perforation error — a stamp or block of stamps that has an error (or freak) in placement
of perforations (top) or that lacks some vertical or horizontal perforation rows (bottom).

Missing-color error — a stamp that has a major printing flaw in which one or
more colors are omitted. The example above shows missing blue and brown colors.

Freak — a minor error in printing, often one that is not a consistent problem but
that may be caused by a paper fold, an ink wiping fault on the plate or similar
problems. In the case above, the year and denomination have been omitted due to
an inking problem along the right side of the stamp.

Official stamp —a stamp that has been specially designated as restricted
for use by governmental agencies.

Specimen stamp — a stamp that is sent by governments to postal agencies
in other countries or are used for promotional purposes by postal or
private organizations. These stamps commonly are marked in some
way that invalidates their unauthorized postal use.

Revenue stamp — a governmentally-produced stamp (perforate or imperforate)
that is not valid for postal purposes but that is intended for revenue collection
or taxation purposes (e.g. documentary taxes on sales, visas, reports, export or
import of goods, and taxes on controlled items like cigarettes and alcohol).

Overprinted stamp —overprints are imprints added to regular stamps after initial production
for any one of a number of reasons. Overprints may be handstamped using inked rubber or
metal dies, or the stamp sheets may be put back onto printing presses to receive the added
inscriptions. Overprints may be used to commemorate special events, to note changes in
governments, to limit or expand the useage of stamps, to denote stamps produced for
publicity needs, as well as for many other purposes. This example notes the
reversion of an oil concession to the government.

Surcharged stamp — surcharges are similar to overprints except that
they involve revaluation of the stamps (in other words, they change the postal
denomination of the stamps involved. In some cases, the same stamp may be
overprinted or surcharged on multiple occasions and/or for a variety of purposes.

Perfin stamp — a stamp that has been hole-punched (pin-perforated)
through the design, either by government agencies or by private
organizations as a security measure to impede unauthorized use.
The examples above were hole-punched with "V.O.Co." for use
by the Vacuum Oil Co. in Egypt.

Precancelled stamp — a stamp that has a overprinted cancellation,
typically featuring the town name and bars, that is applied by
printing or handstamping prior to use of the stamp on a letter
to expedite postal handling of corporate bulk mail. This
example of a precancelled stamp also has perfin punched
letters "S.O." indicating use by the Standard Oil Co.

Service-inscribed stamp — a stamp similar to a precancel in that it
has wording overprinted on the stamp (sometimes also with horizontal bars).
In this case, however, the purpose is to limit useage to bulk-rate mail. The
example at left is the uninscribed stamp; those at center and right have
service inscription overprints that limit use to bulk-rate mail.

Coil stamp — a stamp that is produced for distribution in rolls.
Most coils have perforations only on two sides and straight edges
on the other two sides.

Plate-number coil (PNC) stamp — a coil stamp that has a printing plate number
shown on the lower edge of the stamp. Adjacent stamps would not have this
number as it occurs only once in (typically) 40 or 50 stamps.

Bisect — a stamp that has been cut in half (usually diagonally)
and used to denote half the postage value of the original stamp.
Bisects are not legal in most countries but may be tolerated
or even encouraged in times of crisis when the full range of
needed stamp denominations are not readily available.
Bisects obviously are only collected on cover because
anyone can cut a stamp in half at any time. The
Bolivian petrostamp above was bisected in 1956.

Booklet — one or more small panes or strips of stamps sandwiched
between two paper or cardboard covers to form a small book that allows
users to conveniently carry stamps with them in wallet or purse. Some
booklets like the one above, may have oil themes or advertisments on
the covers or on paper pages between the stamp sheets.

Booklet stamp — a stamp that has been removed from a booklet (see above).
Booklet stamps commonly have one to three straight edges that distinguish
them from sheet stamps. The example above, from Azerbaijan, shows
a small offshore oil platform behind the overprinted "Z".

Label — a printed area adjacent to or between stamps that looks like a stamp
but has no postal validity or imprinted denomination. In the example
above, it is only the label that has a petroleum theme.

Plate block — a block of four or more stamps from the edge of a pane
that includes a plate number in one of its margins.

Date imprint block — a block of stamps that contains a imprint of the
printing or release date in the margins. This imperforate date imprint
block of 1969 includes two different petroleum stamps and
an intervening label.

Tete-beche stamps — stamps in which adjacent examples are inverted relative to
one another as with several of the stamps shown above.

Se-tenant stamps — stamps in which adjacent copies have different designs.
In this example, adjacent stamps share a common motif but differ in
the language of their inscriptions.

Stamp sheet — stamps are commonly printed in large sheets (often with 200 or more
individual stamps arranged in multiple panes). This example shows a full sheet
with four 4-stamp panes and large perforated gutters between.

Gutter block (or pair) — gutters are that areas of full stamp sheets that lie between the
individual panes of stamps that are normally sold to the public. These gutters are the zones
along which stamp sheets are normally cut to produce the panes. In some cases, however, postal
agencies will sell unsevered sheets of blocks that cut across one or more gutters. This example is
termed a traffic-light gutter block because it also contains color blocks in the gutter area
that are used to check the alignment of the multiple print colors.

Cross-gutter block — a block that represents the heart of a stamp sheet with at least four
printed panes. The block shows two intersecting gutters, one vertical and one horizontal.
Note that different stamps can be printed in separate panes of the same sheet.

Souvenir sheet — stamps sometimes are issued in small perforate or imperforate sheetlets
with commemorative inscriptions. These are termed "souvenir sheets", and this
example from Trinidad & Tobago includes several individual perforate
stamps with petroleum or energy themes.

Essay — a drawing, painting or printed material that was created
to propose or test the design of a stamp. Essays differ in some
details, large or small, from the final printed stamp. In this
example, this stamp was never produced and it is termed
an unaccepted essay.

Proof — any trial printings of stamps in their accepted designs that
are made as part of the printing process (die proofs, plate proofs,
color-trial proofs), that are specially produced for presentation to
officials, or that are used to gain final printing approval. The example
above shows a set of trial-color proofs. See article on essays, proofs
and special printings for more details.

Cinderella — a stamp-like label or seal that has no postal
validity but was created by private parties, in most cases as
commercial advertising or to promote as special event. Unlike
the Azerbaijani privately-printed example given above,
most do not carry a denomination.

Pictorial cancellation — an illustrated cancellation applied to
a cover, usually to commemorate a special event. The example
above notes the official opening of the Troll oil field in the
Norwegian sector of the North Sea.

Meter — a meter imprint or meter strip is machine produced postage that
typically is applied mainly to commercial mail. Slogan meters, such as the
one above from Shell Oil Co. in Indonesia, can have illustrations of
oil themes or can have oil company names and logos. These are
collected either as strips (as above) or as full covers.

Postal stationery — consists of government printed envelopes, postal cards or
air letter sheets that include imprinted postal franking (the equivalent of
a stamp). This example not only has imprinted postage that has an oil
theme, it also has a petroleum-related cachet (the illustrative design
on the left side of the cover) and a petro-cancellation.

First-day cover — a cover that was cancelled on the first day of issuance of the
stamp or stamps on the cover. Modern first-day covers commonly also have
a commemorative cachet and cancellation as in the example above.

Maximum card — a card that depicts the same design as an
issued stamp. Such cards carry a copy of the stamp on the
reverse along typically with a first-day cancellation.

Useage cover — a cover that shows the use of a stamp to pay postage and
associated charges. Most desirable are those covers that show useage of
just the single stamp of interest and/or covers that are of non-philatelic
origin such as the commercial cover above.

Illustrated advertising covers —covers that have a cachet or other illustration
that depicts a theme reflective of the company or town from which the
letter was mailed. Such covers have no official (governmental) connection
with the theme depicted and so are not allowed in most philatelic exhibits.
Nevertheless, they are still widely sought after by collectors.

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