Stamps of the Transvaal

Whenever one thinks of the philatelic aspects of the Transvaal, it is almost inevitable that the first thing that comes to mind is the word “forgery”. In the late-nineteenth century, the classic stamps of the “First Republic” and the “First British Occupation” were avidly collected by the leading philatelists of the day – and this attracted the attention of the forgers. The stamps of the “Second Republic” and the “Anglo-Boer War” were dealt a cruel blow with the clandestine production of masses of reprints. Now, after over forty years of collective philatelic research published quarterly in The Transvaal Philatelist, the Transvaal Study Circle is at the forefront of differentiating the genuine from the forged or the reprinted. The Study Circle also examines the historical context within which the stamps and postal history were produced. This dimension is important in understanding why various stamps were produced, and what the significance is of a particular piece of postal history.