Soviet Court Fee stamps and an early Russian revenue
One of the most peculiar items I received from last years stamp exchange, was a set of three Soviet stamps. At the time neither I or the sender (Holger from Germany) did not know what they were, but Holger had a clue they might be court fee stamps. I finally had the time to sit down and look for these at various catalogs, and there they were at Barefoot revenue catalog for Russia. Indeed, these are court fee stamps from the early years of Soviet Union.
1925/1927 Soviet Union. Court fee revenue stamps. Each stamp is multi-lingual accordingly to Soviet Republics in USSR. Barefoot #12,13 and 26.
My compliments to Holger. These add very nicely to my collection of bizarre BOB items 
1882. Imperial Russia, general revenue stamp. Barefoot #6A.
While having the catalog open, I decided to check also another Russian Revenue I’ve had for quite a long time. It turns out this was a general revenue stamp issued in 1882. Almost identical design was used with first Russian revenues of 1875; except bottom part of stamp which consisted of dots instead of horizontal lines.
As usual, happy collecting till next time!
Join the discussion on this topic below. There are 8 responses already!
Want more?
Sign-up to weekly newsletter and get notified when new articles like the above are published at Stamp Collecting Blog. The email-newsletter is sent to You once a week (during the weekend) and it contains a summary of latest new entries and discussions.
Show that you liked this article - and support Stamp Collecting Blog!
Clicking the Like-button below promotes this article on FaceBook:Clicking the +1 button below promotes this entry on Google and GooglePlus.
Thanks for your support!
Good Research, Keijo…what are they worth (because i have about two dozens of them) according to this catalog?
Btw., i found these stamps in a book from J. Stalin “The Questions of Leninism”, where they have been used as bookmarks
It took me a year or two before I finally learned what BOB meant (back of book) and what types of stamp it referred to. It is also the brand name of a one-wheel bicycle trailer that I own (see http://www.flickr.com/photos/williamandmami/94282707/ to see how my wife towed one through Japan). Wouldn’t it be great to have a BOB trailer full of stamps delivered?
…Actually the photo at http://www.flickr.com/photos/williamandmami/73053393/in/pool-36108902@N00/ is even better . . . and now we return you to the programme about stamps.
@Holger… A truly amazing find indeed… The 50k stamp is catalogued at £3.50, the rest are £5 each. Of course with revenues the catalog value is about as good as asking how long is a piece of string.
@William (hadashi)… Actually term BOB is pretty much US only – in Europe we favor term “cinderella”. Both have pretty much the same meaning (except whereas Americans include postage dues, officials etc. as BOB-items, in Europe they are stamps in same sense as regular commemoratives and definitives).
Nice bike & trailer
Ah, I see. In that case New Zealand terminology is the same as European.
Keijo
They are called BOB or “Back of the Book”, because literally these categories in some early U.S. albums were in the back of the book (album)!
I have a little different definition of BOB vs “Cinderella”. BOB were issued by a government, while Cinderellas were not.
As usual, your presentation here is illuminating and interesting!
Although it is true the BOB are often found in the back of U.S. early albums, that should not be too surprising, considering they come after regular and air post. What I meant to say was these categories were found in the back of U.S. (Scott) Stamp catalogues.
BTW, the list of BOB includes:
Special Delivery Stamps
Postage Due Stamps
Revenue Stamps
Newspaper Stamps
Official Stamps
Airmail Stamps
Duck Stamps (or similar wildlife permit stamps)
Postal Stationery
Semi-postal stamps
@Jim… Somewhat similar separation policy applies in European catalogs too (though special delivery stamps, newspaper stamps, airmail stamps and semi-postals are in most catalogs listed along”regular” stamps. All-in-all the BOB section is European catalogs (and albums) is much thinner than in Scott.
And true – term cinderella usually refers to items with non-government origin. A more proper definition would likely be “item that is postal/philately related, but has no postal validity of itself”.