The Penny Venetian Red was a British

postage stamp A postage stamp is a small piece of paper issued by a post office, postal administration, or other authorized vendors to customers who pay postage (the cost involved in moving, insuring, or registering mail), who then affix the stamp to the f ...

equal to the value of one penny. Issued in 1880, it was designed and surface-printed by

security printing Security printing is the field of the printing industry that deals with the printing of items such as banknotes, cheques, passports, tamper-evident labels, security tapes, product authentication, stock certificates, postage stamps and identity ...

company De La Rue. It superseded the Penny Red that had been used in

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It i ...

since 1841, and was the third one-penny stamp to enter regular usage in the country. The Venetian Red was aesthetically similar to the Penny Red and Penny Black that had come before it, but was instead coloured a

venetian red Venetian red is a light and warm (somewhat unsaturated) pigment that is a darker shade of red, derived from nearly pure ferric oxide (Fe2O3) of the hematite type. Modern versions are frequently made with synthetic red iron oxide. Historically, ...

and had a square framing. Close to 1.5 million Venetian Reds were printed during the stamp's run; the printing plates used allowed for 240 stamps each. Like its predecessors, the Venetian Red sported individual letters in each of its corners to identify its position on the plate. : The Venetian Red had a short run, and was replaced by the Penny Lilac in July 1881. Its displacement is attributed to a change in government postal policy: the

Customs and Inland Revenue Act 1881 Customs is an authority or agency in a country responsible for collecting tariffs and for controlling the flow of goods, including animals, transports, personal effects, and hazardous items, into and out of a country. Traditionally, customs ha ...

necessitated the creation of a new provision of

revenue stamp A revenue stamp, tax stamp, duty stamp or fiscal stamp is a (usually) adhesive label used to designate collected taxes or fees on documents, tobacco, alcoholic drinks, drugs and medicines, playing cards, hunting licenses, firearm registration, ...

s. A new inscription was therefore needed, and the new Penny Lilacs featured the words "POSTAGE AND INLAND REVENUE" and "ONE PENNY", instead of "POSTAGE" and "ONE PENNY" that its predecessors bore. It was decided that a new colour would also be desirable to defend against improper re-use; a fugitive lilac ink was used that would run and spoil the stamp if one attempted to wash off the cancellation. The Lilacs broke the tradition of using corner letters and instead had either fourteen or sixteen dots in each corner.

Notes

{{Reflist Postage stamps of the United Kingdom Cultural depictions of Queen Victoria

See also

Notes