Lot 60782 – 1869, 500c black, eleven stars, on piece

1869, 500c black, eleven stars, of great freshness and good colour, slightly centred to the bottom although a good and attractive centring for this stamp, used on piece and delicately tied by “Administración Correos de Bolivia/7 Dc 76/La Paz” cds, very fine; extremely rare in used condition, and the rarest used stamp of Bolivian philately.

Note: Following the note in the previous lot, only 1,000 stamps were printed and this stamp must be very rarely used as the 500c “nine stars” was still available; indeed Claus Lange states that there should only be very few copies used. According to Escalier and Lange, the latest usages recorded were in 1875. It is difficult to ascertain that this example was cancelled to order on 7 December 1876, but this would be the latest usage recorded. No examples used were gathered in the famous Ortiz Patiño collection.