Vertical paid paper or sideways watermark?
by Anatoly Kiryushkin ak@nestor.minsk.by
Recently David submitted to the Russian Imperial stamps catalogue section a sheet of 7R vertical laid paper issue ( to see the whole sheet please click here ). As the sheet had nice fragments of watermark on margins I've cut off a piece with letter "Z" to have an illustration of the watermark. As the letter was sideways I've rotated it 90o and noticed that the paper naturally changed to horizontal laid one instead of original vertical paper ( figure 2 ) but equal naturally the watermark has got a right position.
If to define the issues as Vertical and Horizontal laid paper, as it stated in all catalogues and other philatelic publications it could mean that the Watermark is in both cases upright but paper laid is varying.
Fig 1 
Fig2
As my most respectful publication on Russian Imperial stamps is the Lobachevsky's work. It worth to see what he was mentioning about watermarks. Figure 1 is his illustration of 1966 issue watermark i.e. the issue when the watermark was introduced first. As we can see the orientation of watermark and lines is the same. No difference with illustrations of watermarks position for 1868-1875 Vertical laid paper issue. Fugure 2
Moreover reading the pieces on watermarks again I have noticed the Lobachevsky said different things:
| Lobachevsky | Comments |
| 1866 issue it's described as "Watermark a pattern of wavy and straight lines with and initials EZGB" | OK. the lines are a part of the watermark |
| 1868-1875 - "paper with vertical lines" | This time there are lines but nothing about watermark. Looks as if it was not the same. |
| 1868-1875, in notes: " In 1866 EZGB become to use softer and thinner laid paper with watermark" | Again, - there is a laid paper plus watermark. |
| 1868-1875, in special information: "Watermark. The pattern of the watermark is wavy lines crossed by straight lines under right angle. Between wavy lines are upper case letters E.Z.G.B. for Ekspeditsiya Zagotovleniya Gosudarstvennykh Bumag. | Returning to the first, - the lines are a part of the watermark. Though, in a sober condition, I can not imagine exactly what could look "right angle of straight lines to WAVY lines" Somehow reminds me a Russian joke about triangle cube |
| Continues: :"When cutting paper, it was made to orientated the straight lines (verge) and watermark either across the sheet i.e. horizontally to stamps or along the sheet i.e. vertically". | Another mentioning LINES and WATERMARK. Also it's possible to
imagine what means lines across but what means the watermark across the sheet is
impossible to guess exactly in this case ( keeping in mind all said above ). I'd gave the
piece from the book to read our specialist on printing processes. He was reading a dozen
of words for about 20 minutes and said that he understood each word separately but had no
idea what they could mean all together, - "how it's possible to orientated paper
cutting to a printing form position before the form is printed?!" Well I respect Lobachevsky as a stamp collector but I guess that he had never seen print works from a short distance |
| Continues: "1866 stamps at the beginning were printed on paper with horizontal lines and some later with vertical lines. Since 1889 the horizontal or vertical orientation of lines was strictly regulated" | Nothing said about watermark as if lines were on their own but watermark on its own too. |
| 1884 issue. "Paper size for kop. and Rub. values was 225-235x235-240 | A STRICT REGULATION ( it was said above ) for average paper size 230x237 and printing form allowing wide margins????? Please try to cut a piece of paper of the size and easy find with a naked eye the wider side! But according the information even 235x235 size id possible. For a printing machine it's no difference too. |
Reading Lobachevsky I've found not much details and definitive opinion, but just misty sayings about lines and lettering. SG catalogue ( I guess Ivert, Scott, Michel etc ) firmly states definitive dates of 1866, 1975, 1883, 1889, 1902 issues based on lines' orientation. But if no a sample "vertical laid" paper with horizontal watermark will be found it will mean that the LAID paper is just a MYTH created by collectors who hardly saw paper manufacturing and a printing machine.
I think that it's not a vertical laid paper but a SIDEWAYS watermark. Looking forward to hear your opinion and a prove that I'm not right.
P.S. another myth which looks similar to the "laid" paper: ZAKAZNOE. One can say a REGISTERED. Please believe me it's not true, though I always use the same translation of the word. Collecting GB postal history I was not able to find a way to translate to Russian RECORDED mail. Neither of Russian-English or English-Russian dictionaries mention the word in any connection with postal service. In means of postal services it's just a word of non existence. But according British postal regulations the way of posting, delivery and post office responsibility is EXACTLY the same as Russian Zakaznoe ( by the way Russian postal rules always banned to use Zakaznoe for sending money and valuables, - only documents of no value ) but British Registered mail looks much closer (though not exactly the same) to Russian TSENNOE.
The first known to me mentioning of the wrong translation ( seems a guess of a linguist compiling a dictionary ) was found in postal treaties between Britain and Russia made about 150 years ago ( Official documents were printed in both languages ). The mistake is migrating till nowadays from a dictionary to dictionary from an official document to another but no one care to see not a dictionary but what actual postal service do with that in both countries.
Added by Gary Combs, gcombs@cablespeed.com
I have never studied the paper laying issues to any great depth since it has not interested me. This is one of the areas in which David is keenly interested and I think Alex to a certain degree. We all have asked over and over for a clear cut definition of the printing process from pulp to finished product, i.e., steps involved and processes. It is fairly clear to me how you can make a tray with wires running in any direction you wish and, after applying the wet pulp mixture, the indentations will be "cemented" into the finished paper. What is not clear is how the letters and other marks were made. Were they a part of the "wire wove" upon which the pulp was placed to dry before being rolled smooth? Or were the letters/numbers engraved on the rollers used to make the paper smooth? If it was a part of the "wire wove" box, then the design should be fairly consistent. If it was on the rollers, then variations could occur if the dried pulp did not enter straight. Anyway just my guesses.
Is it Registerd? Insured? Declared value? Nu, chto ehto?
In 1897, there were the following types:
Money Packet (dnezhnyj): for sending interest-bearing securities as well as cash.
Declared value (Tsennyj): for sending packets containing items of value, excluding money. Smirnitskij in the Moscow published 1969 version of the Russian-English Dictionary defines "tsennaya posylka" as a "registered package."
Bundels or small parcels with "gold, silver, or coins" (Uzli s zvonkoyu monetoyu)
Insured correspondence (Strakhovaya) consisted of: Money and Declared Value packets, Declared Value packages, and Bundels/small parcels.
I believe the term Zakaznoe means "Registered."
Added by David Jay, djay@ccalmr.ogi.edu
Well, now Gary has put me on the spot. The problem of how, and especially WHY, these paper varieties came to be has always intruiged me. The first point to make is that all of the laid paper issues are printed on machine paper, not hand-made paper, contrary to some speculations I have read. I sent in to the Rossica journal a copy of an old article from @1930 that provides some inferences regarding the paper and how it was made. I believe that this will appear in the next issue. What I get from this article and older one in the APS journal on early paper making is the following. There was a screen that held the paper pulp, so that one can oven see a wove pattern to the laid paper issues as well as the lay of the paper.
The watermark AND the laid lines were imparted by "dandy roller" and are the opposite side of the paper from the weave. One occasionally sees examples where the dandy roller was not cleaned properly, so that part or all of the laid line and watermark are missing -- there was a stunning block of 1k (?) 1883 issue shown in on the early issues of CJRP. Now how this process interacts with the application of chalk, and whether this could perhaps obscure some of what one normally sees, I have no idea. Anyway, what one sees is that the weave on HLP (horizontally laid paper) stamps is vertical, and the weave on VLP stamps is horizontal. So the variety one sees described as: "narrow vertical laid lines" is (so far as I've been able to examine examples) an HLP stamp where the dandy roller did not impart the watermark and laid lines.
Examples on the 7k 1879 issue are pretty common. The 2k and 8k 1875 issue stamps also provide examples. They become pretty scarce in the 1883 issue, and are usually listed at high prices. They are also scarce in the 1866-75 issue. If one wants to find something scarce, find "narrow horizontal lines"; i.e., a VLP stamp where the laid lines didn't print. I have only on example, a 2k 1875, I believe. It would seem that they learned the lesson with the 7k that they had to keep the roller and screen clean. In general there seem to be fewer anamolies in the issues after 1888, but I still have a few 1902-05 issue examples with laid lines at an angle. I can only suggest that this is the result of salvaging a damaged larger sheet of paper (from which the printing sheets were cut) by cutting it on the bias. All of this gets me nowhere with the following key issue: What was the size of the piece of paper as it was produced by the paper machine? Consider the following.
The Russian gov't was very conservative and didn't change things quickly. Also, the post was always strapped for money. Would they have changed paper making machines every time the lay of the paper changed? I doubt it. This suggests that the same big sheet was cut up into smaller sheets, upon which 100 of the kopek value stamps could be printed, or 25 of the Ruble value, with large margins. This would also mean that the laid lines and watermark would always be aligned the same way. I'm guessing that, since the lay of the paper was reversed at intervals, the basic paper machine produced a ~square sheet that was cut up into smaller pieces. Since the stamps have a height:width ratio of ~4/3, this suggests that 4x3 =12 sheets made up one large sheet in the paper machine.
However, George Shallimof and I talked about this, and came to the conclusion that this would have been too big for the paper machines we saw described for the time. I find the first (1872-79) examples of VLP most intriguing, along with the 3.5 Ruble on HLP. Digression: can anyone put one of the 1880s 3.5 Rb HLP on the site????? Last I saw, Cherrystone wanted $2500 for an example that have been cut in half (literally) and stuck back together; so I concluded I won't get one of those any time soon. It is very clear that that the 10k VLP was printed first and used in the August-Dec 1871 period (August being the first I have). I have yet to actually see any other of the VLP stamps used before Jan 1872, but have seen a Dec 1871 use of the 5k VLP in a catalog. (Caution is needed with catalog descriptions -- auction houses not infrequently confuse the lay of envelope with that of the stamp, resulting in fabulous fantasies). All of the 1-30k came into use by March 1872. But WHY were they printed, and why did the process return to HLP, and then mix VLP and HLP in the 2k-20k and 7k issues later in the 1870s?
Given that the sheet on which the stamps were printed is rectangular, it is not possible to put the sheet through the press with the wrong orientation (OK, with enough vodka, it is possible, but it still seems unlikely and unproductive). If a large square sheet were cut into smaller rectangular sheets for printing, and the orientation of the square sheet was random, then one would not expect to see that 6 years after the initial issue in 1866, all of a sudden the paper orientation changed. This suggests a deliberate change for a certain duration -- perhaps one printing? Perhaps they wanted to keep track of how well some other variable in the printing process (e.g., ink or chalk) worked out, and used the lay of the paper to keep track??? All pure speculation, but I can't do any better. With regard to the 1880s 3.5 Rb on HLP.
I would guess that only one or perhaps a few sheets were printed. It wasn't an accident though -- perhaps a test printing? It seems odds that they went in the end with paper turned 90 deg to that used for the kopek values. But in the next issue, (with thunderbolts), kopek and ruble values were printed with the same orientation -- very curious. This stamp is one of the least understood stamps in Russian philately, and one of the scarcest. With regard to the 1870s Offices in Turkey HLP -- they started these issues in 1872 also, but it is hard to find examples used in 1872. One final point: I do not have any VLP stamps with date stamps that unambiguously demonstrate earlier usage of the VLP varieties than 1872.
However, I do have several dot numeral cancels from places like St Petersburg that should have given up their dot cancels long before 1872. This leaves open the possibility that damaged pieces of paper were salvaged by turning the paper 90 deg to its usual orientation. Further comments are welcome, and Anatoly may well tell me I know nothing about paper making....
Added by Ivo Stejn, ivosteyn@rocketmail.com
I will confess my total ignorance about most Imperial stamps but just add that the Fomin handbook, which covers the 1908 Arms issue as well as later issues, goes into some detail on the size of the printing sheets and the arrangement of the watermark "bands" along the side of the sheet. I was fascinated to read that two different widths of paper roll were used, cut into printing sheets to allow two sheets to be printed side by side but in different orientations for the earlier and later printings.
The point, and I do have one, is that this information was apparently available in the archives for the 1908 issue. Which at least gives us some hope that information about the rationale for the paper orientation might be available in the archives for earlier issues as well.
I'm in complete agreement with Anatoly that the usual "horizontal lines/vertical lines" description should ideally be changed to "upright/sideways watermark lines plus letters", it's just that "horizontal/vertical lines" is so..direct as a description. Incidentally, I'm STUNNED that the orientation of the lines was guarded so thoroughly. I'm still waiting for the discovery of a 1906 high value stamp on horizontal-lines paper (sorry, Anatoly!). They are said to exist and Lobachevskii described them as proofs. I wonder....