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July 2017 | | | | 
On June 19th, the Dutch postal service issued this beautiful set of stamps. The issue focuses on Dutch delicacies and treats, which are special to certain parts of the country. The issue consists of 10 stamps, each depicting one specialty, where most of the specialty are sweets, but a few are more general specialties. For instance Amsterdamse Ui, are pickled onions, and would not be classified as a sweet. Above and below the stamps, tabs are attached, and on these, the corresponding specialty is described. This is however in Dutch, so unless you speak this, you might need some help with translation. All the stamps are depicted in the hands of a person, who can be seen in the background of the picture, thereby determining the background colour of the individual stamps. All the stamps have different background colours, though some are in the same array. All the stamps are denominated at "1", which is standard in the Netherlands, and can be found in our catalogue. | | New area added - Indian Feudatory States At Stampworld, we are always doing our best to stay relevant and up to date. After requests from several valued members of the site, we decided to look into the Indian Feudatory States, which issued stamps in the period between 1864 and 1949, but with varying times for the individual states. 
After a lot of work, we are happy to tell you that stamps by the Indian Feudatory States are now available in the Stampworld Catalogue. For instance you can see the first issue from Alwar here, which was issued in 1877. The early stamps from the Indian Feudatory States were made with quite simple means and technology, and in low volumes, making them rather rare. It also makes them prone for forgeries, as simpler typography is easier to copy. The Indian Feudatory States stamps are a very popular area of collection, and this is based on several things. First of all, the historical aspects of the situation intrigue some collectors. Secondly, although the early stamps are rather rare, the number of issued stamps is not prohibitively high, making it an area of collection, where it is manageable to complete an entire collection.  The era of issuance in the different states differ by quite a bit, but no states issued their own stamps after 1949, making this issue from Gwalior one of the last issues to be made.
As is evident, when you compare the early issues and the late ones, the typography technology improved vastly over the period. The stamp shown here is from 1949 from Gwalior, India, and depicts King George VI in profile. The stamp is locally overprinted, with the printed text "India Postage" crossed out, and "GWALIOR" added on top of it. All of the Indian Feudatory State stamps can be found here. | | Nordfrim A/S - Stamps Worldwide  Nordfrim A/S is one of the leading philatelic companies in the world, and they truly live up to their saying - Stamps Worldwide. They are situated in Denmark, but have subsidiaries and sister companies in all corners of the world. This allows them to provide a world-class service to their customers, no matter where in the world the customer lives. Apart from the fast and reliable worldwide shipping they provide, they also carry content from all four corners of the world at all times. Nordfrim always carry more than 13,000 items in stock, and manage subscriptions for several postal services from different parts of the world. You can see more about the subscriptions they provide right here.
Nordfrim updates their stock often, and their offers are worth checking out. We suggest that you check out Nordfrim's large online store, which can be done by clicking the button below. 
| | In need of a Specialized Catalogue? 
MICHEL Catalogues have been around for many years, and have built up a great reputation, when it comes to specialized catalogues. They are used as a clear point of reference for many European collectors, who have historically based their collections on the MICHEL numbering system. MICHEL carry a wide range of specialized catalogues, both on country and thematic levels, and is recommended if you need to go deeper than what is offered by a regular catalogue. You can see the range of catalogues they offer on their website. | | | | | | |
