Lot 50129 – 1881, 10pa black on greenish, pair on cover from Klisoura with provisional cancel and Russian-type cds’s of Karlovo and Plovdiv

1881, 10pa black on greenish, pair on April 16, 1881 cover from Klisoura to Plovdiv via Karlovo, paying the single domestic rate, tied by circular barred cancel in purple, showing superb strike in blue of Karlovo cds at right, and Plovdiv cds applied on arrival on reverse, also in blue and both being sought-after types in Cyrillic. Few covers originating from Klisoura with provisional cancellations are known; this being of much better quality than the example gathered in the Franz See collection. An exceptional item of Bulgarian and Eastern Rumelian postal history. Cert. Hitzler (2016).

Note: The purple bar cancellation of Klisoura was a provisional usage. This post office had no datestamps available in March and April 1881. All accepted mail received a provisional postmark or was cancelled in manuscript. The mail originating from Klisoura was subsequently forwarded to the post office in Karlovo, where the mail was officially treated with a datestamp and occasionally with a different bar cancel. Both Karlovo and Plovdiv Russian-type postmarks are very rare.