The Inverted Head Four Annas of India is a

postage stamp A postage stamp is a small piece of paper issued by a post office, postal administration, or other authorized vendors to customers who pay postage (the cost involved in moving, insuring, or registering mail), who then affix the stamp to the fa ...

prized by collectors. The 1854 first issues of India included a Four Annas value in red and blue. It was one of the world's first multicolored stamps; the

Basel Dove The Basel Dove (Basel German: ''Basler Dybli'', ) is a notable stamp issued by the Switzerland, Swiss Basel (canton), canton of Basel on 1 July 1845Hertsch, Max. ''Famous Stamps of the World''. Berne: Hallwag Ltd., 1968, p.12. with a value of 2� ...

preceded it by nine years. However, an

invert error In philately, an invert error occurs when part of a stamp is printed upside-down. Inverts are perhaps the most spectacular of postage stamp errors, not only because of their striking visual appearance, but because some are quite rare, and highly ...

occurred during production, showing the head "upside down."

Four annas stamps

The Four Annas stamps were lithographed by the Survey Office in Calcutta. Two colors were used, red for the frame and blue for the head. During production, the

paper Paper is a thin sheet material produced by mechanically or chemically processing cellulose fibres derived from wood, rags, grasses or other vegetable sources in water, draining the water through fine mesh leaving the fibre evenly distributed ...

was first imprinted with the red frames, and then the sheets were laid out to dry overnight. The next day, the blue heads were added within the frames. The First Printing, using Head Die I and Frame Die I, both as show
here
began on October 13, 1854. There were 12 widely spaced stamps in each sheet. Exactly 206,040 stamps were printed for this Head Die I issue.

Inverted head four annas

Among these ''First Printing'' stamps, at least six sheets with the red frames had been inadvertently turned 180 degrees before being placed in the press. So, although the heads appear to be upside down, it was the red frames that were inverted. D.N. Jatia found that at least six sheets must have been fed into the press upside-down, as six of these stamps from Position 4 showed different lithographic stones were used for the head and frame dies. The surviving examples of this error are low in number.

E. A. Smythies Evelyn Arthur Smythies, Order of the Indian Empire, CIE (19 March 1885Bateman, Robert. ''Stamp collectors' who's who''. London: Stanley Gibbons, 1960, p. 81. – 10 January 1975), was a distinguished forester and philatelist, born of British pare ...

states that, at one time, "Details and illustrations of all the known copies eregiven in that interesting publication, ''Stamps of Fame,'' by L. N. and M. Williams." One additional example has been reported, yielding 28 total known examples. All of these are postally used. Only two (or three) are known cut square; another 25 are

cut to shape In philately a cut-out is an imprinted stamp cut from an item of postal stationery such as a postal card, letter sheet, aerogramme or wrapper that may have been used as a normal stamp. Historical aspects In Great Britain the postal use of cut-out ...

(that is, in an octagonal shape). One from the collection of the Earl of Crawford was exhibited in the World Philatelic Exhibition in Washington in 2006.

Discovery of the error

This error appears not to have been discovered until many years after the stamps were issued. None of the 1870s publications mentions the Inverted Head Four Annas. The 1891 reprints provide the first conclusive evidence that the error was known, but E. A. Smythies said the error was first noticed during a meeting of the Philatelic Society of London in 1874. In 1907 L.L.R. Hausburg mentioned the Inverted Head Four Annas, but incorrectly, as he was not sure whether it came from the First or Second Printings. Mr. Séfi described this error in the ''West End Philatelist,'' January 1912.

Collections

Three cut to shape examples of the Inverted Head Four Annas are in the

Tapling Collection The Tapling Collection of postage stamps was donated to the British Museum from the estate of Thomas Tapling in 1891. The probate value of the Tapling collection was set at £12,000 but on arrival Richard Garnett (assistant keeper of Printed Book ...

at the

British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...

, London, including two (positions 3 and 4 on the printed sheet) on cover, indicating that the error was created by an incorrect sheet placement rather than by a careless die transfer. One example, carefully cut to shape, from position five on the sheet, is found in the Royal Collection. The Government of India Collection, in Delhi, has a cut to shape example on the piece, position two on the sheet. Two examples cut square, one of them on the cover, was in the collection of C. D. Desai. Desai "raised" his stamp from its cover for study. The provenance of several other examples is described in Martin and Smythies, as cited below.

Forgeries

Forgeries have been made by chemically erasing the upright head or the frame and then printing over it. These can be detected using "

black light A blacklight, also called a UV-A light, Wood's lamp, or ultraviolet light, is a lamp that emits long-wave (UV-A) ultraviolet light and very little visible light. One type of lamp has a violet filter material, either on the bulb or in a separat ...

" (long wave (UV-A) ultraviolet light) and other techniques. One of these fakes appeared in the Masson sale and one or two in the

Ferrary Philip Ferrari de La Renotière (January 11, 1850 – May 20, 1917) was a noted French-born stamp collector, assembling probably the most complete worldwide collection that ever existed, or is likely to exist. Amongst his extremely rare stamps w ...

auctions. Some clever forgeries purport to show an inverted head with incorrect head dies, which are obvious. Crude forgeries are plentiful.Robson Lowe, ''Encyclopedia of British Empire Postage Stamps,'' v. III: London, Robson Lowe, Ltd. (1951), p. 171.

References and sources

; References ; Sources * D. R. Martin and E. A. Smythies, ''The Four Annas Lithographed Stamps of India, 1854-55'' London,

Philatelic Society of India The Philatelic Society of India (PSI) was formed in 1897 Robson Lowe John Harry Robson Lowe (7 January 1905, London – 19 August 1997, Bournemouth) was an English professional philatelist, stamp dealer and stamp auctioneer. Life and career Lowe is regarded by philatelists as the father of postal history, ha ...

, ''Encyclopedia of British Empire Postage Stamps'', vol. III, p. 171. * E. D. Bacon, ''The Essays, Proofs, and Reprints of the first issued Postage Stamps of British India of 1854-55''. Third edition, 1927 (with the supplement in P.J.I, 1933), page 19. * Leslie L. R. Hausburg, ''The Postage and Telegraph Stamps of British India ... Part I. Postage Stamps.'' London:

Stanley Gibbons The Stanley Gibbons Group plc is a company quoted on the London Stock Exchange specialising in the retailing of collectable postage stamps and similar products. The group is incorporated in London. The company is a major stamp dealer and philat ...