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Egypt, Turkish suzerainty

Monday, January 1, 1866

↓ - Independence -
Offices and Occupation-
Suez Canal Company

Middle East


	Egypt Sc1-4	xxx

	Watermark 118, Pyramid & star

Printed by Pellas Brothers, Genoa, Italy

Surcharged on stamps of Turkey.
Description	# issued	Scott	SG	Balian
5 paras greenish gray	254,400	1	1	1
10 paras brown	238,600	2	2	2
20 paras blue	240,199	3	3	3
2 piasters yellow	165,400	4	5	5
5 piasters rose	18,400	5	6	6
10 piasters gray	7,600	6	7	7
No watermark.
1 piaster rose lilac	1,190,667	7	4	4

All issue quantities are approximate

The meaning of suzerainty is that Turkey took care of foreign policy, but Egypt handled their own internal affairs.

Changes of Administration

Egypt also has changes of administration to offer as it became a republic in 1953 after the overthrow of King Farouk; joined with Syria in the United Arab Republic in 1958 (Syria left in 1961); and reverted to the Arab Republic of Egypt in 1971. Both Scott and Gibbons number sequentially through these changes.


Republic	United Arab Republic	Arab Republic of Egypt
1953 Sc322 SG495	1958 Sc438 SG552	1971 Sc872 SG1110

Offices Abroad and Occupation Issues

Gibbons lists Egyptian Offices Abroad in Sudan, the Turkish Empire and East Africa, but these are only identifiable from postal markings as no specific stamps were issued.


British Forces in Egypt	French Offices in Egypt, Alexandria	French Offices in Egypt, Port Said
1932 Sc-M1 SG-A1	1899 Sc1 SG1	1899 Sc1 SG101

Foreign post offices in Egypt from Austria, Britain, Greece, Italy and Russia again have no specific stamps, but British Forces and French Offices do offer stamps.

Suez Canal Co.

1868 Sc SG1-4

Suez Canal Company

The French company that built the Suez Canal transported mail between Port Said and Suez free of charge from 1859 until 1867, but then introduced a charge. This proved unpopular and the Egyptian govt. took over the service.
Decent images of these stamps proved difficult to find. There were four values; 1centime black, 5c green, 20c blue, 40c pink. An image of the set from the Egypt Study Circle is shown (permission has been sought, and given 4th Aug).

Sources:
Leon Balian, Stamps of Egypt, 1998, Heliopolis, Egypt
Scott Standard Postage Stamp Catalogue, 1976
Stanley Gibbons Stamp catalogue, Part 19, Middle East, 2009

Images from David Olson, ebay, the Egypt Study Circle.

FI ref: 129 342, 343

Page credit: JA/NB

Page created 19 Feb 2014

Page updated 25-May-2017

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