Third forgery of Album Weeds
Return To Catalogue - Geneva forgeries, part 1 - Geneva forgeries, part 2 - Geneva (Switzerland) - Switzerland overview
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Many forgeries exist of the stamps of Geneva, in the early 20th century already 15 forgeries of the double stamp and 34(!) forgeries existed imitating the larger stamps and the envelope (according to Album Weeds), they even exist printed on genuine paper obtained from the envelopes.
Geneva forgeries, part 1
Geneva forgeries, part 2
Third forgery of Album Weeds
This forgery has inscription 'INS' instead of 'IHS'. There is no accent on the second 'e' of 'Geneve' and no dot behind this word. The rays that should exist around the letters 'INS' are reduced to very short dashes. I have seen this forgery (green colour) cancelled with some black blotches.
Fourth forgery of Album Weeds
This forgery has inscription 'INS' instead of 'IHS'. It also has 'FIST' instead of 'POST' in its inscription. The rays around 'INS' are quite small compared to a genuine stamp. The scroll with 'FIST' almost touches the left hand inner frame line. There seem to be several types of this forgery (described as forgery five and six in Album Weeds): in forgery five the rays are longer than in this forgery. In forgery six 'INS' has been changed to 'IHS' and the rays are also longer.
Fifth and sixth forgeries(?) of Album weeds, with sunrays behind
'Poste de Geneve'. They are all slightly different from the above
stamps, but have the inscription 'FIST'.
Seventh forgery of Album Weeds
Inscription 'Poste de Geneve' very small, inscription 'INS',
right stamp is black on lilac(!)
The above forgery has the inscription 'INS' instead of 'IHS'. The text 'Poste de Geneve' is smaller than 'TENEBRAS' (it should be the other way around). The rays around 'INS' are reduced to very short dashes. There is no dot behind 'Cantonal'. I don't think the cancel on the first stamp was ever used on any genuine Geneva stamp.
In this forgery the word 'de' is exactly in the middle between 'Poste' and 'Geneve' (it should be closer to 'Geneve'). This forgery exists in the wrong colour (green instead of black on green).
Eight forgery of Album Weeds
These forgeries are similar in design, note the strange foot of
the eagle, which has only three claws. The wing touches the upper
part of the shield and has 11 feathers.
Fourteenth forgery of Album Weeds
The above forgery could very well be the fourteenth forgery described in Album Weeds; it is supposed to imitate the small eagle stamp. There is no dot anywhere behind the words or value. The scroll at the right approaches the letter 'C' too much. This forgery is said to originate from a forger from Geneva and is usually overprinted with 'FACSIMILE' in violet. It might be a Champion forgery.
Two forgeries with almost the same cancel:
(Black on green and green stamp, apparently made by the same
forger)
Peter Winter also made forgeries (about 1980), examples:
Some photographic forgeries:
From a distance these photographic forgeries look quite reasonable, but a zoom-in reveals the newspaper photo-alike dots:
(Zoom-in revealing the newspaper photo-alike dots)
Forgery in the wrong colour: green instead of black on green
In the Fournier Album of Philatelic Forgeries, the above forgery can also be found. It doesn't have the usual 'FAUX' overprint, neither the 'FAC-SIMILE' overprint on the backside. It might have been only sold by Fournier and actually have been made by another forger.
Here another envelope cut, pasted on a piece of paper, with a
forged 'GENEVE 23 MAI 50 2 S' cancel placed beside the cut and a
rozette cancel on it (click on Switzerland
Fournier forgeries for more information)
Another forgery with 'GENEVE 15 FEVR. 47' cancel taken from a
Fournier Album (reduced size)
The next forgery could be a Fournier forgery:
Left image obtained thanks to Augusto Bulgarelli. There always
appears to be a dot in the lower part of the '5'. The second
stamp has a "FACSIMILE" overprint which appears to have
been erased on the first one (parts of it are still visible near
the "C").
Some other Fournier products with 'FAUX' overprint and one from
the Fournier Album.
(Block of 4 forged green stamps)
The green envelope stamps cannot exist in blocks (since it was only issued on envelopes!). Therefore the above block of 4 stamps must be forgeries. I posess several of these forgeries, they have 'FAC-SIMILE' printed on the backside as in the Fournier forgeries, although they do not appear in The Fournier Album of Philatelic Forgeries.
Other Fournier forgery of the envelope stamp
Fournier forgeries taken from a Fournier Album:
Sperati forgery of the Large Eagle design. The 'P' of 'Poste' has
several smudges at the top in this forgery.
Sperati also made a forgery of the Small Eagle design, he did not make any forgeries of the envelope stamp.
Sperati forgery of the small eagle design.
Other forgery of the envelope stamp
A Menke-Huber postcard with replicas
of Geneva and arms of this city.
Another Menke-Huber postcard with some
replicas of Geneva and other stamps of
Switzerland.