Christoph Gärtner is going to conduct a “Worldwide Public Auction” on February 22-26. This sale offers a great number of stunning philatelic items from all over the world, including world rarities and post-historically significant stamps. The undisputable star of this sale is 1897 Red Revenue, small 2 cents surcharge in Black-Green (dark green), position 9, which is offered with a starting price of €170,000 (or roughly $206,000).
The auction house described this lot as: “…centered a bit to base just like the example from the Robert C.H. Lee collection, dot extremely misplaced, part original gum, no tears but oxidized, fine (Chan 84Ta). A remarkable example from the earliest trial printings. This is one of only 4 recorded copies so far.”
This black-green surcharge is known as the dark-green surcharge by Chinese specialists. There are several explanations of how this variety occurs. The most believable one is that a black surcharge was applied over the green trial surcharge on one set of twenty stamps. The resulting surcharge in black on green ink similarly heavy and smudged. The printing block required neat cleaning, which was not performed, producing the phenomenon of a green-black surcharge.
