There is so much that stamps can teach us about a county's economic health and its politics. In fact, stamps are like capsules of time The early nineteen twenties saw the world go through an economic depression. Germany too had undergone a difficult period of economic recession. The Deutsche Mark was getting devalued so often that the postal department decided not to print new stamps. Instead of printing new stamps, existing stamps were over-printed as there was no point in issuing new stamps because the market was so volatile! A few of the stamps of the period 1921 to 1923 a period of hyperinflation have been posted below.
As might be noticed, the overprinted value is greatly at variance with the original printed value of the stamp. A 5 million Mark stamp is devalued to 2 million Mark stamp! Economists termed it hyperinflation.
Surprisingly enough, German stamps have different names of the country on them. The names of the country could be Byern, Deutsche Reich, or even Deutsche Land. The name Deutsches Reich refers to the name that Germany had meaning Third Reich, and the stamps posted below were issued in the from the years 1934 to 1936.
One more interesting stamp of Germany issued in the year 1924 include the ones posted below.
As stated above, German Stamps had different names for the country on them. During times, leading to the Second World War the name Deutsche Reich was written on the stamps. After the Second World War, during the allied occupation, the German stamps carried the title Deutsche Land. An interesting fact is that during the occupation of Germany after the end of the Second World War, postal services were resumed and the stamps were also inscribed with the letters, 'AM' meaning, Allied Military. I have posted a couple of these stamps below.
Many of us have a lot of curiosity about stamps belonging to the period of Hitler's rise to power in Germany, the fact remains that most of them happen to common. The allies are known to have made a large number of fake stamps during the period as a way of destabilizing the economy of the country. A few examples of stamps issued during the period of Hitler's rise to power are posted below.
The first of the two Bavarian Stamps posted below, issued from 1914 to 1918 portrays King Ludwig III of Bavaria while the second one issue in the year 1911, portrays Luitpold, Prince regent of Bavaria.
Without a doubt, these stamps cover a lot of history, what with the names for the country changing with the times, a testimony to the changing boundaries of the country, a country going through hyperinflation and finally a country under allied governance. Contemporary stamps of Germany have a different name for the country and its postal service. They are inscribed with the words, Deutsche Bundes Post.
Nice and short blog post about stamps in Germany. When letter post are becoming obsolete in many parts of the world, in Germany, still the post service is actively contributing to the economy of Germany and Deutsche post is one of the company in DAX30 indices.
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