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When P. Kanner wrote his article in 1956 the second watermark hadn't yet been introduced [june 1956 Tribes 50, 120, 200, 250]. Reading his article closely you will find no reference to an assumed relation between printing on the wrong side and printing-methods. It's just that the drawings on page 502 suggest that in photo-litho the watermarks, both Israel and Stag, will be inverted, whereas in photogravure they will be upwards. This somehow got misunderstood by the ArGe, maybe because actually the first 7 Israel stamps having a Stag watermark do indeed show an different stag direction [reversion: 'IV instead of IV, not inversion though] depending on printing method. |
Kanner suggests positions 5-8 are reversed and appear when paper gummed on the wrong side is used but the reasons for the delivery of such paper are not easy to ascertain. It may be due to the fact that the intention of the Israel Post Office was to have the position of the running stag moving from right to left when seen from the gummed side of the paper. English paper manufacturers, however are accustomed to the watermark reading from the printed side of the paper. |
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M. Hesky [4] sort of confirms this: the makers of the dandy roll were instructed to arrange this watermark in such a way that the stag would appear to run from right to left if seen from the gummed side of the paper. H.H. Hirst [3] points out again [6] to the tradition of viewing watermarks from the face, the only normal Stag position is the one upwards facing left. The Herzl stamp, being the first having the Stag watermark, shouldn't therefore be considered normal but inverted and reversed. |
Hirst is of course absolutely right. The watermark was facing left, up to June 1956 at least it was. Tsachor [8] about the Israel watermarks are as described below when the stamp is held with the printed side facing the observer. [The depicted watermark has the stag running from right to left]. |
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Hesky's and Kanner's statements about deliberate arrangement of watermark or instructions to dandy roll makers can't be true. The first dandy roll used produces a Stag facing to the left, visible from the felt side, the non wire-marked side, as it should in all aspects!! In order to satisfy philatelists who prefer to view the watermark from the gummed side, Hesky et al must have asked the printers, [assuming that the printers not the papermakers applied the gum arabic], to gum on the right side of the paper thus risking bad printing results. The alternative is that Lewin Epstein preferred to print on the wrong side which does'nt make much sense to me either. |
Thus, the Herzl and TABIM stamps of 1954 [both in photo-litho] had been printed on the wrong, wire side, but the Rothschild and Teachers [both in photogravure] were again printed on the right side. Hesky should have realised that the second watermark got introduced in early 1956. The last 4 of the 12 Tribes values [50, 120, 200, 250] issued 05-06-56 do have the second watermark, but for a small part of the 250 [not the very first sheets though [10] ] as Kanner [2] was told by the Postal Services. Was the second watermark a mistake, Hesky [5] refers to a wrong manufacture has in the past come into use, or simply the result of the confusion all over?? At the time of Hesky's second reaction [april 1957] the use of watermarks for the definitives [Tribes] had already stopped. |