Stamps out

NEW commemorative stamps depicting Cyprus postal routes in the days of horse-drawn carriages and steamships have been released by the TRNC Post Office Directorate.

The stamps, published by the State Printing House, are available in denominations of 1.25TL and 12.5TL. They have been digitally printed on watermarked paper in sheets of eight and will be on sale for one year.

A total of 40,000 stamps – 20,000 of each denomination – have been printed, along with 2,200 first-day covers worth 15.75TL.

According to information provided by the Post Office Directorate, a Turkish post office was established in 1871 in Lefkoşa, and then another in Larnaca (Tuzla) “under the jurisdiction of the central office at Damascus”.

“The Ottomans had a contract . . . with Monsieur M Taillard to establish a postal service to connect the capital city with the seaport with mail steamers, to take the place of the existing uncomfortable eight-hour journey on muleback,” an information note posted to Cyprus Today said.

“The vehicle was a heavy omnibus and needed six horses to pull it, as depicted on the stamps. “There were two changes of horses between Lefkoşa and Larnaca. This service was running right up to the end of Otttoman rule in 1878, and continued under the British.”

The note added that “regular steamship lines were established during the Ottoman period in Cyprus”.

These included the “Austrian Lloyd”, which operated a service between Trieste, İstanbul, Rhodes, Larnaca and Beirut.

“A P&O steamer was running between İstanbul and Beirut, via Larnaca. Captain Bell’s Asia Minor company, which operated from İzmir, conveyed letters between various ports in the Levant, including Larnaca. A drawing of one of the steamers of this company is shown on the stamps.”

The stamp design also bears the old “manuscript cancellation” with the word “Kıbrıs” (Cyprus) written in the Arabic alphabet.