Plating Guide for Plates III and IV of the First Design HRAD ANY 5 H Knihtisk Series 1: Vol. 1, No. 2 by Ing. Stanislav Komberec 1991 Originally published as STUDIJNÍ FILATELISTICKÉ PÌÍRU KY 32/1997 Hrad any 5h I Studie III. a IV. tiscové desky Translated into English with the permission of the Spole nosti sb ratelç eskoslovenských knihtiskových známek by Dr. Mark Wilson KNIHTISK Winchester Virginia
Copyright 2003 by Lunasa LLC. All rights reserved. Translated from the original Czech by special permission of the Society for Collectors of Typographic Stamps, Prague. Knihtisk is the imprint of Lunasa LLC, of Winchester, Virginia. www.knihtisk.com. Knihtisk is a labor of love. Its publications represent the volunteer work of fellow collectors and are sold at prices that merely sustain production. Manufacturing or accepting unauthorized copies undercuts the efforts of contributors and may discourage further work. The only authorized source for copies of Knihtisk publications is Lunasa LLC. Please support this effort to bring out-of-print, highly specialized, or materials hidden behind the veil of other languages into the hands of collectors by refusing to accept copies from unauthorized sources. Of course, you may make print or make electronic copies for your personal use, but you must never release or keep a copy to avoid payment. Please note that series, volumes within series, and numbers within each volume may be published non-sequentially and at irregular intervals. Suggestions for future publications or your own contributions should be sent to the published address of Knihtisk. Caveat: This is an amateur translation by a collector who professes no special knowledge of the Czech language. As a result, there may be unintentional misrepresentations of the meaning of the original text. The alternative would have been to keep the translation private rather than sharing it with other interested collectors. Suggestions for corrections, clarifications, or additional information should be emailed to info@knihtisk.com or sent via ordinary mail to Knihtisk, 316 Devland Drive, Winchester, Virginia 22603. The Translator. Cover Illustration: Horizontal gutter on craft paper, First Design 10h and 5h. January 2003. Slight revision March 2003. November 2003 corrections. April 2004 Title page and title normalized. ii
This study of the first design Hrad any 5h value, completed and published in 1991, continues the 1989 work on plates I and II by examining plates III and IV. A high demand for the regular issue 5h value developed early in 1919, forcing the Czech Graphic Union to create plates III and IV in August 1 of 1919 as a means to increase production of this first design Hrad any 5h stamp. Both new plates were put into service in Printing Form A1 with the older plates I and II: Since plates I and II originally joined with plates I and II of the first design Hrad any 10h into a single printing form had been in use from December 16, 1918 onward, and since plates III and IV were used only in August of 1919, one may quickly conclude that no substantial number of sheets were printed using the latter plates. Because of this, it is thus possible to totally document every printing run for these sheets (for example, see stamps 15, 40, 77, and 81 from plate IV). Printing or plate defects that occur only sporadically are enclosed within forward slashes / in the descriptions for each position. 2 Stamps of the first design 5h value printed from plates I and II cannot be compared to the stamps printed from plates III and IV, for the latter subtly demonstrate that Mucha s First Design is by far the most aesthetic of the five designs implemented. Most noticeably, there are few stamps with exaggerated corners jutting outward, not many sullying blemishes or marks within the value tablet, and deformations to the letters forming MUCHA are rarely seen. However, it is true that the tête-bêche gutter pairs from the 5h did not come from plates III and IV, but are instead only associated with the printing form mentioned above that combined plates I and II with the 10h plates. According to data found in Volume 1 of the Monografie z. známek, they were in post offices only between the 21 st and 25 th of December 1918, when because of the pressure to quickly get new stamps into circulation, time was saved by cutting the four panes of the printing sheet only in a vertical direction, leaving two panes still attached to one another. The sign that identifies sheets printed from plate III is the chip in the lower part of the numeral 5 in the control number under the first column of stamps:.50; and for plate IV, there is a bevel on the lower part of the zero in the control number 2.50 under the fifth column of stamps. 1 Tr. The Printing Form A1 is described in the Monografie, Dil 1, p. 103. Since the fifth design 5h appeared in August, the statement in the text is somewhat confusing. Could it mean April? The A1 caption in The Monografie on page 341 implies that this form was put into use on May 10 and rebuilt as form A2 on May 12, 1919, when plates III and IV were removed and replaced with 400h plates. 2 Tr. The forward slashes / have been converted into parentheses within the text. Each occurrence of a description lacking matching demarcations is noted. iii
Unsatisfactory or insufficient milling in the spaces between the stamps and at the edge of the sheet caused defects, especially on plate III, which often appear as continuous fine straight or sagging lines or as intermittent dashes and bent lines. Perforation Guides are found in two setups at these locations: Plate III Plate IV Setup 2 Setup 3 9.5 mm 9.0 mm Stamp 51 Stamp 60 9.0 mm 8.5 Stamp 41 Between stamps 50/60 Nail Hole Locations: 3 Plate III Plate IV Setup 2 Setup 3 1.0 mm Stamp 41 8.5 mm Above Stamp 41 Stamp 10 To the right Stamp 90 Trials and Essays: For the most part, the respective black prints, essays, and printing press trials for the first design 5h value are described in the study of plate I and II. Color and Paper Variations: Just as for plates I and II, color variations resulted from the postwar scarcity of raw materials such as Green Dye II No. 403 from the firm of Auerbach, Weissberger & Co. in Kozolup u Plzn. Other causes, such as an uneven mixture of the color or variations in the amount of pressure applied to the cylinders on the printing press, produced further color variations. The quality of the paper used for printing plates III and IV did on average improve over that used for printing with plates I and II. For the most part, it is evident that a thick white paper from the Labsek Mlýn had been used. Major Defects: Common printing defects for plates III and IV (according to the Monografie) are: on stamp 14 the main ray emits a drop; on stamp 23 break in the left branch; on stamp 47 a white spot above the left forked line; on stamp 78 a thick dash on the wing of the right dove; and on stamp 100 a saw-toothed roof ridge following the right hand branch. The remaining number of confirmed defects found for the most part fall on: Stamp 7 two breaks in the main ray. Stamp 9 white spot between the of ESKO and the shrub. 3 Tr. The third column is not explained in the text, nor is the shift from mm to descriptive locations. iv
Stamp 11 shorter main ray. Stamp 16 doubling of the upper part of the main ray. Stamp 18 chipped left frame near the dove. Stamp 22 the fifth spiral has a horizontal break. Stamp 37 dot above shortened main ray. Stamp 44 main ray resembles an exclamation mark (!). Stamp 45 dot in the tenth leaf at 9:00. Stamp 48 dot near the lower right corner. Stamps 52 and 61 dot on the tail of the left dove. Stamp 63 firm ray to the left of the first tower. Stamp 75 large dot to the left of the first tower. Stamp 86 dot on the joint between the second and third leaves. Stamp 88 displaced main ray. Unusual Printing Defects: Insufficient milling in the space between the stamps, especially on plate III, show up on some sheets as long, sometimes broken dashes and bent lines surrounding the design s borders. This is particularly true for stamps from the positions 11, 12, 13, 21, 24, 31, 41, 81, and 91 near the left frame, 49, 56, 60, 64, 65, 78, 80, 84, and 89 near the upper frame, 43 near the right frame and 9, 27, 30, 35, 37, 44, 53, 66, 72, 74, 82, 92, 97, 98, and 100 near the lower frame on plate III, and near positions 51, 71, 81, and 85 on plate IV. Perforations: The following perforations are found on the first design 5h. Line perforation 11½ (Type A). Mixed perforation 11½ x 10¾ (Type C). Line perforation 13¾ (Type B) made for archival purposes by the Ministry of Posts in May 1919. 4 Specimens: The 5h stamp was the principal Hrad any value overprinted with VZOREC [Specimen]. Initially, four such sheets were supplied from the production of December 18, 1918 (one sheet for officials of the World Postal Offices in Bern, and three for other UPU member states). A far larger quantity was produced in February 1920, for the use of collectors, which, as it was of a shiny and deep color, differed from the original dull gray-black overprint. For the same purpose, the Ministry also provided perforated overprints of each of the Hrad any values. Trial overprints of VZOREC on the 5h value were executed on cardstock and on brownish paper. Additional shiny black overprints of VZOREC for the 5h value were done on thin paper in an imperforate version, on cardstock with a line perforation of 11½, and on thick paper with a line perforation of 11½ x 10¾. Other Notes: 4 Ministerial Perforations: stamps that were made for the archives of the Postal Museum. Most carry the overprint VZOREC or SO 1920. See Monografie, Dil I, pages 239-41 Tr. v
Users of this study should be advised that late into it I found abnormalities in the main ray at stamp positions 9, 15, 25, and 88 on plate III, and for position 88 on plate IV. The displacement of the main ray especially at its base and spaces of from 1 to 1 ½ dots wide between the dots in the right-hand part of the sun s rim, appear only in the survey defect sketches on page 51 and 61; they are not mentioned in the textural descriptions of the individual stamp positions (until stamp 88). However, these defects are neither pronounced nor stable enough to be the determining characteristic for any particular stamp position in question. Positions 2, 27, 34, 47 and 67 on plate III and 47 on plate IV have no main ray Reviewing and checking stamps for plates III and IV is as difficult as stamps for plates I and II; perhaps even more so because the color shades are not different, because so few examples are available (I sorted through eighteen thousand), and because there are so few clean partial sheets from these plates (they do not have them in the Postal Museum). I have been able to complete this study of plates III and IV only because of the generous lending of half-sheets from J. KopÍiv from Zlína, to whom I send a most heartfelt thank you! Because the 5h has a high percentage of sheets in a lighter color and was done in typography especially the overprinted stamps they make excellent illustrations. All of the types and subtypes for this stamp were evaluated in terms of the Hrad any Pricelist, published by The Society for Collectors of Czechoslovak Typographic Issues. The author of this study is working on finalizing the Study of the First Design Hrad any bistre 30h stamp, which he expects to publish in 1992. Prague, August 1991 Stan. Komerec vi
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