British embossed postage stamps British embossed postage stamps The adhesive embossed postage stamps of the United Kingdom, issued during the reign of Queen Victoria between 1847 and 1854 exhibit four features which are unique to this issue: Three values of the octagonal stamps were introduced to cover higher foreign and registered postal charges on the following dates: 1 Shilling (green) - 11 September 1847, 10d (brown) - 6 November 1848, 6d (mauve/lilac/purple) - 1 March 1854 The 1 shilling was the first British postage stamp to bear a value above 2d. The dies used for this type of printing have the embossed, (raised), portions
First stamp of the Russian Empire On 20 October 1857, Alexander II approved three two-colour samples printed in denominations of 10, 20, and 30 kopecks. On 9 November, the Emperor ordered to call them "postage stamps" instead of "stempel" stamps. Manufacturing of the 10-kopeck stamps began in November. The first Russian postage stamp was printed on a white hand-made paper with a watermark in the form of a figure "1", 15 mm heigh. Since a punching machine ordered from the in Vienna was received only on 19 November and in a state of disrepair, it was decided to hand over a part of the printed imperforate