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TURKEY / Ottoman Empire

A brief listing of telegraph seals was included in William T. McDonald's book "Revenue Stamps of Turkey".
Those after 1915 were all censor's seals and it seems that it was impossible to send a telegram in or from Turkey
without its being checked by the censors for much of the twenty years following 1915.
In the 1880s seals in Turkish and French were used on folding forms with a flap and in the 1890s these seem
to have become self-adhesive requiring no additional seal. Procedure between 1894 and 1914 is not yet known.

Updates. The above was written by Steve Hiscocks.
It seems sensible to include seals of the Ottoman Empire under this
heading, in line with what I have done with Austria and Russia.
In 1928 the Latin Alphabet replaced the Ottoman Turkish.
Re-ordered using 'RH' (Revised Hiscocks) numbers.
No pricing as yet.

Seals-pg-53bc
At the beginning of the Electric Telegraph era there was still quite a lot of the Ottoman Empire left. Much of it was heavily influenced by France.
By 1914 it was largely confined to Turkey.

 

Turkey-coa Turkey-tughra Turkey-emblem
The Ottoman Empire apparently
had no need of a coat of arms until
a request from Hampton Court in
1882 prompted them to design one.

Turkey commonly uses
the star and crescent
as an emblem ☪

At the top is the tughra
(calligraphic monogram) of Sultan
Abdul Hamid II.
The two flags were those of
the Islamic Caliph in green
(with 3 crescents) and
the Ottoman Dynasty in red.

 

Arabic-numerals
Arabic numbers 0 to 9
When using cancels on telegrams to get the dates, there are some complications.
From 1840 to 1926 the Ottoman Empire used the Rumi calendar.
After converting the date from Arabic, add 584 years to get the Gregorian (Western) date.
After 1926, Gregorian dates were used, though sometimes dropping the first '1'.

 

Turkey-1 Seals-pg-53bc Turkey-1-Egypt
#1 (described as Turkey) Pink ? 37.6mm 44mm (listed as #3 of Turkey, pale lilac) 1875 ? (listed as #1 of Egypt, light blue)

My Note:  #1 looks the same as the one listed as #1 of Egypt (1875).

RH # Type. was Description Mint Used On telegram
RH1 1 #3 Die-cut. Black on pale lilac / pink. - - -
RH2 1 Egypt #1 1875? Die-cut. Black on pale light blue. - - -

 

 

Seals-pg-53ba Seals-pg-53bb Seals-pg-53bd
#2 1882, 38mm #3 1886, 34mm #4 1889-1902, 26mm
This used in Mont Athos, Greece but see below.

 

RH # Type. was Description Mint Used On telegram
RH3 2 #1 1882 Imperf. Black on white. - - -
RH4 3 #2 1886 Imperf. Black on white. - - -
RH5 4 - 1889-1902 Part-perf. Black on pink. - - -

Turkey-Piraeus-1902

This was used in Piraeus (written Pyrei, main port of Athens) in 1902. The perforated flap appears to be the source of #4 above.
(shown half size)
The telegram is headed with Imperial Administration of Posts and Telegraphs in French and Ottoman Turkish.

 

 

Turkey-new-b Turkey-new-b
1900 (dated ١٣‎١٦‎ by Rumi calendar), 47mm, McDonald #13a 1902 (dated ١٣١‎٨‎ by Rumi calendar)

I had originally thought that these were seals due to the lack of any apparent face value.
I learned however from Eric Lerner that these are actually Patent Medicine Revenues. I guess they were paid for by the sheet.

 

 

 

Istanbul (اسطنبول) Army Censor ?

Seals-pg-54aa Seals-pg-54ab Seals-pg-54ac
#5 1914, 48mm #6 44.9mm #7 48.1mm

 

Seals-pg-54ba sp-11 Seals-pg-54bb
#8 1915, 40mm (43 scallops) #9 41.1mm (46 scallops)   small star #10 41.5mm (36 scallops)   larger star

 

Seals-pg-54bc Etiquette ?
#11 44mm (29 scallops) #12 34.4mm an etiquette ? I know nothing about this.

There are other differences apart from the scallops and colour however:

sp-11a sp-12a sp-13a sp-12a sp-13a
Type #9. Type #10. Type #11. Type #10. Type #11.
The left of the central script is slightly different between all three. The right side is similar for the reds, but aligns differently to the outer script for the green.

The colours are likely to signify the Islamic Caliph with green and the Ottoman Dynasty with red.

 

RH # Type. was Description Mint Used On telegram
RH6 5 #4 1914 Rough Perf. Red on white. - - -
RH7 6 #5 Perf. 11, Red on white. - - -
RH8 7 #6 Perf. 11½, Red on white. - - -
RH9 8 #7 1915 Scalloped (43). Red on white. - - -
RH10 9 #8 Scalloped (46). Red (shades) on white. small star. - - -
RH11 10 - 1917 Scalloped (36). Red on white. large star - - -
RH12 11 #9 Scalloped (29). Green on white. - - -
RH13 12 - Scalloped. Red on white. Script only. - - -

Hiscocks added the following note:

Note. The dimensions of #s 7-9 [now H9-H12] above are those of the actual seals since the indefinite
                limits of the design make my normal practice of measuring the width of the design difficult.

 

 

 

Seals-pg-54cc Seals-pg-55aa
#13 1914-15 #14 1915, 76mm

 

RH # Type. was Description Mint Used On telegram
RH14 13 #12 1914-5 Scalloped (36). Red on white. - - -
RH15 14 #16 1915, Perf. / imperf. ? Black on white. - - -

Hiscocks added the following note:

Note. The large seal, #16[now #14] , is reported by McDonald as a censor's seal used
                in 1915 on telegrams sent to territories and provinces in the Ottoman Empire.
                It is black on white. A scan of a better example is needed.

 

 

Seals-pg-54ca Similar to last Seals-pg-54cb
#15 1923-28, 31mm   (stamp width) #16 1923-25, 33.5mm   (stamp width)
#17 27.5mm

detail of #17  detail of #18
The difference between #15 and #16 is probably easiest to see in the '99's between the two 'uprights'

 

 

Latin script from 1928.

Star & Crescent only. 1929 seal. Seals-pg-54da Seals-pg-54db
#18 1928? 22.7mm Star & Crescent only. #19 1929 19.3mm across text. Perf. 12 #20 1939-48, 41.8mm #21 1934, 28mm

 

Seals-pg-54dc
#22 1955? 30mm
RH # Type. was Description Mint Used On telegram
RH16 15 10 1923-28 Perf. 11½. Red on white. - - -
RH17 16 - 1923-25 Perf. 11½. Red on white. - - -
RH18 17 11 Perf. 11½. Red-brown (shades) on white. - - -
RH18a             Rough perf. 11½. - - -
RH18b             Rough perf. 11½. Rose-red on white. - - -
RH19 18 - 1928? Rough scallop. Red on white. No script. - - -
RH20 19 - 1929 Perf.12. Violet text only. - - -
RH21 20 13 1939-48, Perf. 9. Red on white. - - -
RH22 21 14 1934, Rough perf. 11? Red on white. - - -
RH23 22 15 1955? Rough perf. 9? Red on white. - - -

 

Railway

Railway - CCDD
The Turkish railway network came under State control in 1927 and was subsequently
called the TCDD (Türkiye Cumhuriyeti Devlet Demiryolları)

 

RH # Type. was Description Mint Used On telegram
RH24 23 - 1927? CCDD, Red on white. - - -

 

If anyone can provide scans to help with this, I am happy to give appropriate credit.

 

 

Comments, criticisms, information or suggestions are always welcome.

Emale

Please include the word 'Precancels' in the subject.

 

Last updated 27th. January 2024

©Copyright Notice: This work was originally started by Steve Hiscocks and being continued by myself (Steve Panting).
For simplicity, my additions are under the same conditions as the original work by Steve Hiscocks.

 

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