Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Nothing promotes a hobby like a checklist. Can you point me to a list of town cancels to look for in each country? or perhaps you'd like to share your personal list with the club?
I personally am most interested in lists for Sweden and Norway, but Stamporama could maintain lists from every country as a resource for its members, if only in this thread...
Chris
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Chris, check out the link section under "interests etc", there is a link I submitted awhile back with lists for British Commonwealth countries.
Mike in NC / meostamps
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09:18:06pm
Several of th Billig's handbooks contain lists of town cancels for certain nations and often identify cancels that bear a number and/or letter as an identifier.
Of course, that set was assembled in the 1950s so subsequent cancels would require a newer list.
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Excellent! I forgot about the links pages. Probably because they seem so jumbled to me. They could use better categorization (or sub-categorization). (I'd be willing to help straighten them out.)
I found the British Commonwealth postmarks site you mentioned. I also found one for Great Britain postmark that you posted elsewhere on the discussion board that I did not see on the Links page (http://philatelicweb.com/pmks/index.php) though I can't tell if it's a complete list, or just somebody's collection.
Any more?
Chris
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"Reading the discussions about collecting postmarks has piqued my interest. I might just go through some dupes and see how many I have and perhaps start a new collection, but how do I know when I'm done? "
Why would you ever want to be done? When it's done, the thrill of the chase is over!
I recently dug out my New Jersey postmark collection that I started as a kid. I had forgotten about it and found it in my recent deep dig into my hoard. It was stored in a shoe box that was pretty much full. I counted over 350 covers, one per town, and some towns with more if I had an additional interesting cancel or two. I thought for sure that I must be nearly complete, so I pulled out an old zip code directory. To my dismay and maybe delight... I found that I had only collected a small fraction of the post offices!
The collection is now in two binders, in clear Ultra-Pro 2 pocket pages that hold four covers each.(two per side) So my collection isn't too shabby and I will show it off a bit, but I still have enough room for collecting to keep me busy for quite some time!
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LOL, because hunting and never finishing the "kill" is just walking around the woods dressed like a tree smelling like pee.
More to the point, a list helps my search. If I have seven postmarks and the list says there are ten, I'll know that I should keep looking, and indeed what to look for. Conversely, if I have ten postmarks (out of ten) but don't have a list, I might waste years looking for more and being disappointed, when I could have started a new collection and had more fun hunting...
Some of us like an open collection, while others prefer more structure. I am one of the latter.
Chris
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Hi Chris. Those are the only 2 sites that I know of. From what I read on them, they both appear to be listings based on the authors' own collections so they would not be complete but can be used as a good place to start. For the one listed in the link section, you might want to email the author (addy at the bottom of his intro page) and see if you get any reply regarding a possible update of the lists. Hopefully, he is still with us and might have some more info. As to the other site, I know that the author Allan has posted recently on another chat board and that Londonbus was going to contact him but do not know the outcome of that. Again, an email to him (addy at the bottom of his intro page) should get a reply if it is still good. From what I seen, he has created several web based articles on different aspects of stamp collecting and postal history.
Mike in NC / meostamps
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Found another (incomplete, but good start) for Netherlands, plus some Belgium.
http://postmarkshop.com/files.php
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I collect a lot of different postmarks. There probably exist more or less complete lists of post offices for all countries, in one way or another. Comprehensive list of existing postmarks, because each post office may have over the years have used a many many different postmarks, are much less common. Often lists only exists for certain popular styles. It is a vast subject. "Collecting postmarks" has its own distinct rules from "collecting stamps."
For Sweden, the standard resource is the Facit Postal VIII catalog.
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Hi thebiggnome;
I think this is what you are seeking:
England click here
Scotland click here
Wales click here
Northern Ireland click here
Republic of Ireland click here
France click here
I use these all the time to sort thru stamps for specialists that collect them.
If you have most of the town name but are missing a few letters, try using the command; Find in
this page... on the Edit menu of FireFox.
I have over 200 town marks for the UK. some are very amusing names indeed; Cricklewood,
Nottingham, Pontypridd, Paddington, Charing Cross, and Moreton-in-Marsh, to name but a few.
And if you look up their history on Wikipedia, they are even more interesting as well, with histories
as far back as Neolithic times.
Wikipedia has town name lists of most nations of the world, and many states and provinces.
Have fun sortin'....
TuskenRaider
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@Rhinelander, while you were typing I was digging out my old Facit Special and noticed it had a list of known postmarks for Norway #1, but I didn't see anything similar in Sweden. I can't afford €50 for the book for the collection I haven't even started yet, but maybe someday...
@TuskenRaider, I had considered looking up a Wikipedia list, but I wasn't sure how well such lists might correspond to postmarks. I live in an area with several small towns that lack post offices (though I remember a stamp club meeting in the early 80s where an experienced collector gave a presentation on postmark collecting and was so proud of his cover from one of those tiny towns which had a post office for a few years before it closed).
Meanwhile, I found this:
http://www.stampsoftheworld.co.uk/wiki/Category:Postmarks
Chris
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Hi Chris;
to answer your question, I don't think these lists take into account that they have a post office.
The one for France is 20,000 population and up if I'm not mistaken. But the ones for the UK have
some very small towns, and also some neighborhoods in Greater London, Like Ealing, Charing
Cross, and many others.
I have also used Wikipedia to research postmarks that were not even towns, but train or tube
stations.
Also thank you for that link, I'll add to my bookmarks ASAP.
Good luck....
TuskenRaider
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For English postmarks you would need a considerably larger database than a list of major towns, unless you planned to restrict your collection to recent times. Unless I'm much mistaken, every village post office once had its own CDS, and the total would run into tens of thousands. Postmark collectors might confine themselves to a particular county to limit their search to reasonable proportions.
I am charmed by Ken's short list of "very amusing names indeed"! I can assure him that lurking within our shires there are some that are even more amusing than Cricklewood (lived next door in Kilburn in 1966), Nottingham (which was Snotengaham a millennium ago) and Moreton-in-Marsh, a picturesque Cotswold village (Christmas holiday 1996). You could get a whole new (off-topic) thread of 'funny' English postmarks, you really could!
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I have a distant ancestor from Barking...
Chris
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I'm glad to see you good folks are also interested in postmarks!! I love searching for postmarks, first of all old postmarks in my study for 'used abroad' issues. Here are some useful links if interested in 'used abroad'
For France and post offices abroad pre-1900, try this:
http://marcophilie.org/b0.html
(For 'PC' and 'GC' postmarks
For early UK and abroad postmarks, try this:
http://www.gbps.org.uk/information/po-numbers/provincial2.php
and this:
http://www.gbps.org.uk/information/po-numbers/provincial1.php
India and used abroad:
I found and excellent site with 10000's of India and abroad postmarks, but the link is not active anymore. Luckily I copied most of the contents to an searchable excel file, which I can share on mail if interested
Turkey - Ottoman Empire including Middle East etc
http://worldpostmarks.net/HTML%20Countries/turkey.htm
In general, here is almost everything....
http://worldpostmarks.net/
Good luck!! 
Jon
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Hi Guthrum;
Glad you enjoyed my short list of villages. Do you know the significance of Paddington, and Tyburn?
Did you know how Bognor Regis got it's current name?
I must confess to being an anglophile. When in the US Navy I got to meet a lot of Limies, as the Royal
Navy had several Mine Sweepers stationed in Manama Bahrain. Our ship was the USS Valcour and was
stationed there also. I used to drink a lot of Beefeater's at the British sailors club on Bahrain. It was
there that I invented the Gin Gimlet.
I often use Wikipedia to look up history factoids about many of those amusing villages. I'm still looking
for a cancel from Sunderland, County Durham, home of James Harriot, and also Thirsk, Yorkshire,
where he later had his rural practice near the Yorkshire Dales.
My fantasy of course would be to own a cover written in his own hand with a clear postmark, from
either Sunderland, or Thirsk.
My favorite stamps of Britain are of course, Victoria, Edward, and George V & VI.
Just chillin'....
TuskenRaider
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In English place names the suffix -ton is obviously enough 'town' (or more accurately 'settlement'). The element 'ing' often refers to a 'people' or 'tribe' and dates from the early Anglo-Saxon period (5th-8th centuries AD). The first element (in this case 'Padd-' often refers to the name of a tribal leader. Thus Paddington might be 'the settlement of the Peadings', or 'the people of Peada'. Such place names are usually the only reference we have to local chieftains whose deeds or importance are long forgotten.
Paddington is such a commonplace London word (it is the main railway station to all points west) that it would not strike an Englishman as unusual. Tyburn is no longer in use, but marks a notorious area where public executions were held - today in the upmarket area around Marble Arch and Hyde Park. The element 'burn' nearly always has to do with a river, brook or stream, and no doubt there's still one there somewhere, deep underground.
The 'Regis' in a place name is always a mark of royal favour, usually dating from the early 19th century. Bognor is also Anglo-Saxon, the 'ora', or seashore of Boga or Buge, whoever he was.
Sunderland is a major city in the north-east, and a postmark should be easy to come by. Thirsk is also well-known, though I have not been to either.
The above is unreferenced and based on my Anglo-Saxon studies from nearly fifty years ago! Ekwall was the standard reference book in those days. But you could verify or expand the knowledge by googling place-names, and many books have been written on the subject.
I've just found this reference for you: http://kepn.nottingham.ac.uk/ I expect you could spend hours in there!
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For those interested in British place names the Wikipedia entry for the place usually gives one ( or more ) origins, and chain of changes of a place name.
The problem with this is that up to the late Middle Ages only the clergy was literate and there was no standard English spelling until well after that date, and things were written from phonetics, and bearing in mind differing regional accents and dialect it is not surprising that the origin of many names are little more than guesses.
To add to the comments above most (but not all)large Roman settlements end in Caster or Ceister although the source to the present is not always obvious Colchester was Camalodunum and Leicester was Ratae. Londinium to London is one of the obvious ones. York was Eboracum, but the current York name is derived from both the Anglo-Saxon and Norse versions.
"By" and "Thorpe" suffixes normally signify Danish or Norse,and the full name tends to refer to a settler or a physical feature of the landscape. A number of two- word place names have the second name specifying the Norman feudal lord granted the manor after the Norman Conquest - for example Broughton Astley in Leicestershire was awarded to Thomas D'Estley - hence the local secondary school is Thomas Estley College.
English place names ( as opposed to Scottish and Welsh, which are relatively but not entirely straightforward) are far more complex than is often thought due to the many different linguistic influences of successive invasions - and I would submit that a student of English postmarks has a gateway to much Fascinating ( although ultimately perhaps useless)information - but as a history buff I am somewhat biased!!
Malcolm
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For 19th and early 20th century Commonwealth postmarks try the "pbbooks" website.There are several articles on Australian and States postmarks on stampboards.com, and there are numerous rest-of-the-world resources available via the various specialist philatelic societies.
There must be hundreds if not thousands of unrecorded postmarks lurking in collections of stamp collectors who are not interested in postmarks,it is worth giving close attention to any accumulations you may obtain.
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Hi Guthrum & Everyone;
This is something I read in Wikipedia:
Tourism gradually took off in Bognor during the 19th century, with the area being chosen as an
ideal location for King George V to convalesce during 1929, the King and Queen actually staying at
Craigwell House in Aldwick.
As a result, the King was asked to bestow the suffix "Regis" ("of the King") on "Bognor". The peti-
tion was presented to Lord Stamfordham, the King's Private Secretary, who in turn delivered it to
the King. King George supposedly replied, "Oh, bugger Bognor." Lord Stamfordham then went back
to the petitioners and told them, "the King has been graciously pleased to grant your request."
and another amusing tidbit about Paddington:
Webster's dictionary defines three slang terms related to Paddington: "Paddington Fair Day" which
refers to a public hanging day at the Tyburn gallows (Tyburn being part of Paddington Parish);
"Paddington Fair" which means a public execution; and "To dance the Paddington frisk" which
means "to be hanged". Webster's dictionary cites Brewer's Dictionary and the Dictionary of the
Vulgar Tongue, 1811, for these uses of Paddington. Public executions were abolished in England
in 1868.
I hope that the above quotes do not offend someone as being too graphic or vulgar.
To compare to the American west in the 1800s, killing someone or stealing their horse, would
get you hanged, often referred to as "stretching your neck". Altho gunfights in the street were
seldom punished, as most towns had no law officer, or the survivor was only defending himself
from the challenger. True Grit!!
Just Chillin'....
TuskenRaider
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My Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (Millennium edition), always to hand by my desk, sure enough gives the 'Paddington fair' usage (which I did not know). Out of delicacy to modern sensibilities it no longer mentions dancing the Paddington frisk!
What about 19th century American postmarks? How widely distributed were they? Can you get contemporary Tombstone, Abilene and Wichita covers from the days of Wyatt Earp, or Fort Sumner in Billy the Kid's time? Actually it would be fun just to acquire modern-day postmarks of some notorious old-time places.
(As you can tell, I know nothing of the US Postal History of the Wild West! My dad said he could remember Wyatt Earp's obituary in the English newspapers. Dad would have been 16 then. That impressed me as a child brought up on tales of the Old West.)
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Mr. Richard Frajola has some nice resources on western US postal history.
http://rfrajola.com/
(Modified by Moderator on 2015-06-11 08:19:13)
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The Norwegian Postal Museum do have a postal database with a list over post offices. There is an English version, but it seems flawed to such an extent that it's not very usable (could be a temporary thing as I don't use the option myself normally). Maybe google translate is an option?
The postal database: http://www.maihaugen.no/no/Postmuseet/Poststedsdatabasen/
In the right column there are three options, if you use "Søk alfabetisk" you can click each letter in the alphabet and get a list in alphabetical order for each of the letters.
http://www.maihaugen.no/no/Postmuseet/Poststedsdatabasen/?Panel=alfa&a=alfa
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A bit of useless information (very) loosely on topic. The town of Halifax in Yorkshire was heavily dependent on wool products. Hence the theft of cloth was a capital offence and the perpetrator was sent to the "Gibbett". There is still a Gibbett Street in Halifax and until recently the Gibbett ( or a replica thereof) was on public display in the town centre. ( Wyatt Earp ain't got anything like it! )
Malcolm
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Reading the discussions about collecting postmarks has piqued my interest. I might just go through some dupes and see how many I have and perhaps start a new collection, but how do I know when I'm done?
Nothing promotes a hobby like a checklist. Can you point me to a list of town cancels to look for in each country? or perhaps you'd like to share your personal list with the club?
I personally am most interested in lists for Sweden and Norway, but Stamporama could maintain lists from every country as a resource for its members, if only in this thread...
Chris
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
Chris, check out the link section under "interests etc", there is a link I submitted awhile back with lists for British Commonwealth countries.
Mike in NC / meostamps
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Silence in the face of adversity is the father of complicity and collusion, the first cousins of conspiracy..
01 Jun 2015
09:18:06pm
re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
Several of th Billig's handbooks contain lists of town cancels for certain nations and often identify cancels that bear a number and/or letter as an identifier.
Of course, that set was assembled in the 1950s so subsequent cancels would require a newer list.
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
Excellent! I forgot about the links pages. Probably because they seem so jumbled to me. They could use better categorization (or sub-categorization). (I'd be willing to help straighten them out.)
I found the British Commonwealth postmarks site you mentioned. I also found one for Great Britain postmark that you posted elsewhere on the discussion board that I did not see on the Links page (http://philatelicweb.com/pmks/index.php) though I can't tell if it's a complete list, or just somebody's collection.
Any more?
Chris
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
"Reading the discussions about collecting postmarks has piqued my interest. I might just go through some dupes and see how many I have and perhaps start a new collection, but how do I know when I'm done? "
Why would you ever want to be done? When it's done, the thrill of the chase is over!
I recently dug out my New Jersey postmark collection that I started as a kid. I had forgotten about it and found it in my recent deep dig into my hoard. It was stored in a shoe box that was pretty much full. I counted over 350 covers, one per town, and some towns with more if I had an additional interesting cancel or two. I thought for sure that I must be nearly complete, so I pulled out an old zip code directory. To my dismay and maybe delight... I found that I had only collected a small fraction of the post offices!
The collection is now in two binders, in clear Ultra-Pro 2 pocket pages that hold four covers each.(two per side) So my collection isn't too shabby and I will show it off a bit, but I still have enough room for collecting to keep me busy for quite some time!
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
LOL, because hunting and never finishing the "kill" is just walking around the woods dressed like a tree smelling like pee.
More to the point, a list helps my search. If I have seven postmarks and the list says there are ten, I'll know that I should keep looking, and indeed what to look for. Conversely, if I have ten postmarks (out of ten) but don't have a list, I might waste years looking for more and being disappointed, when I could have started a new collection and had more fun hunting...
Some of us like an open collection, while others prefer more structure. I am one of the latter.
Chris
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
Hi Chris. Those are the only 2 sites that I know of. From what I read on them, they both appear to be listings based on the authors' own collections so they would not be complete but can be used as a good place to start. For the one listed in the link section, you might want to email the author (addy at the bottom of his intro page) and see if you get any reply regarding a possible update of the lists. Hopefully, he is still with us and might have some more info. As to the other site, I know that the author Allan has posted recently on another chat board and that Londonbus was going to contact him but do not know the outcome of that. Again, an email to him (addy at the bottom of his intro page) should get a reply if it is still good. From what I seen, he has created several web based articles on different aspects of stamp collecting and postal history.
Mike in NC / meostamps
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
Found another (incomplete, but good start) for Netherlands, plus some Belgium.
http://postmarkshop.com/files.php
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
I collect a lot of different postmarks. There probably exist more or less complete lists of post offices for all countries, in one way or another. Comprehensive list of existing postmarks, because each post office may have over the years have used a many many different postmarks, are much less common. Often lists only exists for certain popular styles. It is a vast subject. "Collecting postmarks" has its own distinct rules from "collecting stamps."
For Sweden, the standard resource is the Facit Postal VIII catalog.
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
Hi thebiggnome;
I think this is what you are seeking:
England click here
Scotland click here
Wales click here
Northern Ireland click here
Republic of Ireland click here
France click here
I use these all the time to sort thru stamps for specialists that collect them.
If you have most of the town name but are missing a few letters, try using the command; Find in
this page... on the Edit menu of FireFox.
I have over 200 town marks for the UK. some are very amusing names indeed; Cricklewood,
Nottingham, Pontypridd, Paddington, Charing Cross, and Moreton-in-Marsh, to name but a few.
And if you look up their history on Wikipedia, they are even more interesting as well, with histories
as far back as Neolithic times.
Wikipedia has town name lists of most nations of the world, and many states and provinces.
Have fun sortin'....
TuskenRaider
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
@Rhinelander, while you were typing I was digging out my old Facit Special and noticed it had a list of known postmarks for Norway #1, but I didn't see anything similar in Sweden. I can't afford €50 for the book for the collection I haven't even started yet, but maybe someday...
@TuskenRaider, I had considered looking up a Wikipedia list, but I wasn't sure how well such lists might correspond to postmarks. I live in an area with several small towns that lack post offices (though I remember a stamp club meeting in the early 80s where an experienced collector gave a presentation on postmark collecting and was so proud of his cover from one of those tiny towns which had a post office for a few years before it closed).
Meanwhile, I found this:
http://www.stampsoftheworld.co.uk/wiki/Category:Postmarks
Chris
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
Hi Chris;
to answer your question, I don't think these lists take into account that they have a post office.
The one for France is 20,000 population and up if I'm not mistaken. But the ones for the UK have
some very small towns, and also some neighborhoods in Greater London, Like Ealing, Charing
Cross, and many others.
I have also used Wikipedia to research postmarks that were not even towns, but train or tube
stations.
Also thank you for that link, I'll add to my bookmarks ASAP.
Good luck....
TuskenRaider
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
For English postmarks you would need a considerably larger database than a list of major towns, unless you planned to restrict your collection to recent times. Unless I'm much mistaken, every village post office once had its own CDS, and the total would run into tens of thousands. Postmark collectors might confine themselves to a particular county to limit their search to reasonable proportions.
I am charmed by Ken's short list of "very amusing names indeed"! I can assure him that lurking within our shires there are some that are even more amusing than Cricklewood (lived next door in Kilburn in 1966), Nottingham (which was Snotengaham a millennium ago) and Moreton-in-Marsh, a picturesque Cotswold village (Christmas holiday 1996). You could get a whole new (off-topic) thread of 'funny' English postmarks, you really could!
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
I have a distant ancestor from Barking...
Chris
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
I'm glad to see you good folks are also interested in postmarks!! I love searching for postmarks, first of all old postmarks in my study for 'used abroad' issues. Here are some useful links if interested in 'used abroad'
For France and post offices abroad pre-1900, try this:
http://marcophilie.org/b0.html
(For 'PC' and 'GC' postmarks
For early UK and abroad postmarks, try this:
http://www.gbps.org.uk/information/po-numbers/provincial2.php
and this:
http://www.gbps.org.uk/information/po-numbers/provincial1.php
India and used abroad:
I found and excellent site with 10000's of India and abroad postmarks, but the link is not active anymore. Luckily I copied most of the contents to an searchable excel file, which I can share on mail if interested
Turkey - Ottoman Empire including Middle East etc
http://worldpostmarks.net/HTML%20Countries/turkey.htm
In general, here is almost everything....
http://worldpostmarks.net/
Good luck!!
Jon
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
Hi Guthrum;
Glad you enjoyed my short list of villages. Do you know the significance of Paddington, and Tyburn?
Did you know how Bognor Regis got it's current name?
I must confess to being an anglophile. When in the US Navy I got to meet a lot of Limies, as the Royal
Navy had several Mine Sweepers stationed in Manama Bahrain. Our ship was the USS Valcour and was
stationed there also. I used to drink a lot of Beefeater's at the British sailors club on Bahrain. It was
there that I invented the Gin Gimlet.
I often use Wikipedia to look up history factoids about many of those amusing villages. I'm still looking
for a cancel from Sunderland, County Durham, home of James Harriot, and also Thirsk, Yorkshire,
where he later had his rural practice near the Yorkshire Dales.
My fantasy of course would be to own a cover written in his own hand with a clear postmark, from
either Sunderland, or Thirsk.
My favorite stamps of Britain are of course, Victoria, Edward, and George V & VI.
Just chillin'....
TuskenRaider
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
In English place names the suffix -ton is obviously enough 'town' (or more accurately 'settlement'). The element 'ing' often refers to a 'people' or 'tribe' and dates from the early Anglo-Saxon period (5th-8th centuries AD). The first element (in this case 'Padd-' often refers to the name of a tribal leader. Thus Paddington might be 'the settlement of the Peadings', or 'the people of Peada'. Such place names are usually the only reference we have to local chieftains whose deeds or importance are long forgotten.
Paddington is such a commonplace London word (it is the main railway station to all points west) that it would not strike an Englishman as unusual. Tyburn is no longer in use, but marks a notorious area where public executions were held - today in the upmarket area around Marble Arch and Hyde Park. The element 'burn' nearly always has to do with a river, brook or stream, and no doubt there's still one there somewhere, deep underground.
The 'Regis' in a place name is always a mark of royal favour, usually dating from the early 19th century. Bognor is also Anglo-Saxon, the 'ora', or seashore of Boga or Buge, whoever he was.
Sunderland is a major city in the north-east, and a postmark should be easy to come by. Thirsk is also well-known, though I have not been to either.
The above is unreferenced and based on my Anglo-Saxon studies from nearly fifty years ago! Ekwall was the standard reference book in those days. But you could verify or expand the knowledge by googling place-names, and many books have been written on the subject.
I've just found this reference for you: http://kepn.nottingham.ac.uk/ I expect you could spend hours in there!
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06:05:09am
re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
For those interested in British place names the Wikipedia entry for the place usually gives one ( or more ) origins, and chain of changes of a place name.
The problem with this is that up to the late Middle Ages only the clergy was literate and there was no standard English spelling until well after that date, and things were written from phonetics, and bearing in mind differing regional accents and dialect it is not surprising that the origin of many names are little more than guesses.
To add to the comments above most (but not all)large Roman settlements end in Caster or Ceister although the source to the present is not always obvious Colchester was Camalodunum and Leicester was Ratae. Londinium to London is one of the obvious ones. York was Eboracum, but the current York name is derived from both the Anglo-Saxon and Norse versions.
"By" and "Thorpe" suffixes normally signify Danish or Norse,and the full name tends to refer to a settler or a physical feature of the landscape. A number of two- word place names have the second name specifying the Norman feudal lord granted the manor after the Norman Conquest - for example Broughton Astley in Leicestershire was awarded to Thomas D'Estley - hence the local secondary school is Thomas Estley College.
English place names ( as opposed to Scottish and Welsh, which are relatively but not entirely straightforward) are far more complex than is often thought due to the many different linguistic influences of successive invasions - and I would submit that a student of English postmarks has a gateway to much Fascinating ( although ultimately perhaps useless)information - but as a history buff I am somewhat biased!!
Malcolm
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06:14:29am
re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
For 19th and early 20th century Commonwealth postmarks try the "pbbooks" website.There are several articles on Australian and States postmarks on stampboards.com, and there are numerous rest-of-the-world resources available via the various specialist philatelic societies.
There must be hundreds if not thousands of unrecorded postmarks lurking in collections of stamp collectors who are not interested in postmarks,it is worth giving close attention to any accumulations you may obtain.
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
Hi Guthrum & Everyone;
This is something I read in Wikipedia:
Tourism gradually took off in Bognor during the 19th century, with the area being chosen as an
ideal location for King George V to convalesce during 1929, the King and Queen actually staying at
Craigwell House in Aldwick.
As a result, the King was asked to bestow the suffix "Regis" ("of the King") on "Bognor". The peti-
tion was presented to Lord Stamfordham, the King's Private Secretary, who in turn delivered it to
the King. King George supposedly replied, "Oh, bugger Bognor." Lord Stamfordham then went back
to the petitioners and told them, "the King has been graciously pleased to grant your request."
and another amusing tidbit about Paddington:
Webster's dictionary defines three slang terms related to Paddington: "Paddington Fair Day" which
refers to a public hanging day at the Tyburn gallows (Tyburn being part of Paddington Parish);
"Paddington Fair" which means a public execution; and "To dance the Paddington frisk" which
means "to be hanged". Webster's dictionary cites Brewer's Dictionary and the Dictionary of the
Vulgar Tongue, 1811, for these uses of Paddington. Public executions were abolished in England
in 1868.
I hope that the above quotes do not offend someone as being too graphic or vulgar.
To compare to the American west in the 1800s, killing someone or stealing their horse, would
get you hanged, often referred to as "stretching your neck". Altho gunfights in the street were
seldom punished, as most towns had no law officer, or the survivor was only defending himself
from the challenger. True Grit!!
Just Chillin'....
TuskenRaider
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
My Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (Millennium edition), always to hand by my desk, sure enough gives the 'Paddington fair' usage (which I did not know). Out of delicacy to modern sensibilities it no longer mentions dancing the Paddington frisk!
What about 19th century American postmarks? How widely distributed were they? Can you get contemporary Tombstone, Abilene and Wichita covers from the days of Wyatt Earp, or Fort Sumner in Billy the Kid's time? Actually it would be fun just to acquire modern-day postmarks of some notorious old-time places.
(As you can tell, I know nothing of the US Postal History of the Wild West! My dad said he could remember Wyatt Earp's obituary in the English newspapers. Dad would have been 16 then. That impressed me as a child brought up on tales of the Old West.)
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re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
Mr. Richard Frajola has some nice resources on western US postal history.
http://rfrajola.com/
(Modified by Moderator on 2015-06-11 08:19:13)
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07:10:41am
re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
The Norwegian Postal Museum do have a postal database with a list over post offices. There is an English version, but it seems flawed to such an extent that it's not very usable (could be a temporary thing as I don't use the option myself normally). Maybe google translate is an option?
The postal database: http://www.maihaugen.no/no/Postmuseet/Poststedsdatabasen/
In the right column there are three options, if you use "Søk alfabetisk" you can click each letter in the alphabet and get a list in alphabetical order for each of the letters.
http://www.maihaugen.no/no/Postmuseet/Poststedsdatabasen/?Panel=alfa&a=alfa
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10:59:23am
re: Are there lists of town postmarks by country?
A bit of useless information (very) loosely on topic. The town of Halifax in Yorkshire was heavily dependent on wool products. Hence the theft of cloth was a capital offence and the perpetrator was sent to the "Gibbett". There is still a Gibbett Street in Halifax and until recently the Gibbett ( or a replica thereof) was on public display in the town centre. ( Wyatt Earp ain't got anything like it! )
Malcolm
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