A few weeks ago, I wrote about stamps issued by Biafra and Eritrea Since then, I have become acquainted with the stamps issued by Katanga, which like those of Biafra were used in postal systems and which are considered ‘real stamps’ by the philatelic community. On the other end of the spectrum, I have also…

Unlike flags and currency, which lend themselves to displays of banal nationalism, stamps, which are by their nature ephemeral, lend themselves to more overtly political statements, alongside the more predictable series of flowers, gems and wildlife. A small number of states take advantage of this and issue stamps marking the attainment of independence by another…

While we expect new states to produce stamps, it’s rather more striking when proto-states attempt to stamp their authority on the (inter)national stage, before they even become independent. Biafra, which attempted to secede from Nigeria between 1967 and 1970, first over-printed classic Nigeria stamps (the example here is by the French artist Maurice Fievet), and…

One way of thinking about how new states present themselves – to their citizens and their neighbours – is to compare the political iconography of ‘before’ and ‘after’. Zanzibar reveals a dramatic disjuncture in this regard. Before independence Zanzibar’s stamps always include the sultan’s image, often as the main subject of the stamp. The stamps…