2099 🇬🇧🇨🇦🇦🇺🇳🇿 Queen Elizabeth II Becomes World’s Second Longest Reigning Monarch.

 

Events.

  Today, 12 June 2022, Queen Elizabeth II became the second verifiably longest reigning monarch of a sovereign state in the history of the world by passing the reign length of King Rama IX of Thailand (1946-2016). In addition she achieved this distinction by being the monarch of not one but four independent countries for that length of time - United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Her reign has now lasted 70 years and 126 days and to become the verifiably longest reigning monarch of a sovereign state in the history of the world she needs to reign for 72 years and 110 days which is the length of time that Louis XIV sat on the throne of France though for the first few years he was a minor and therefore did not himself rule.

  Despite all this Queen Elizabeth still has a long way to go to catch up on the verifiably longest reigning monarch of a (mostly) non-sovereign country - King Sobhuza II of what was then Swaziland who reigned for 82 years and 254 days from 1899 to 1982. Swaziland achieved independence in 1968.

 I had long believed that the non-verifiably longest reigning monarch in history had been Pharoah Pepi II of the sixth dynasty of Egypt  (2278BC - 2184 BC - a total of 94 years) but Wikipedia accords that distinction to Minhti, King of Mrauk U in present day Myanmar (1279-1374, 95 years). I am not aware that either of them have featured on a postage stamp. 

  Though The Queen still has a good many years to reign to catch up with Minhti and Pepi (24 and 25 years respectively by which time she would be aged 120 and 121 - not entirely impossible in this modern age) she can undoubtedly stake claim to be the person who has been depicted on most postage stamps since they were invented in 1840 and furthermore the definitive series depicting her image from the sculpture by Arnold Machin which first appeared in 1967 and is still in use today (in various formats) is the one of the world’s longest running stamp issues, without interruption, in philatelic history, having now been in use for 55 years.

  General and philatelic history combined.

  Finally, the stamp design featuring The Queen which I most want to see in the future will be that of The Queen taking tea with Paddington The Bear which was something we all enjoyed watching last weekend during the Platinum Jubilee celebrations. Paddington, by the way, seems to have had more than his fair share of appearances on stamps but who is complaining?

2019. 🇬🇧 Queen Elizabeth II - Her Platinum Jubilee.

 

  🇬🇧 The present Head of State of The United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand will celebrate her Platinum Jubilee in those four independent states on 6 February 2022. She was visiting what was then the British colony of Kenya, with her husband Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, when she received the news that her father, King George VI, had died in London. 

  She had passed the night in a special tree house at Treetops Hotel so that on the occasion of her Silver Jubilee the Kenyan postal service was able to depict her and Philip at Treetops with the inscription, “For the first time in the history of the world a young girl climbed into treetops one day a Princess and she climbed down from the tree the next day a Queen - God bless her!”

  The new Queen and her consort returned to London via the RAF base at El Adem in Libya and on arrival at Heathrow was greeted by the prime minister, Winston Churchill, as well as Anthony Eden who would succeed Churchill as the Queen’s second premier and Clement Attlee, the Leader of The Opposition.

  Elizabeth II is presently the world’s 4th longest reigning monarch of a sovereign state in history and is now not far behind Prince Johann II of Liechtenstein (1858-1929, reigned 93 days longer) and King Bhumibol  Adulyadej of Thailand (1946-2016, reigned 128 days longer) but some way behind King Louis XIV of France (The Sun King, 1643-1716, reigned 2 years and 112 days longer). However Queen Elizabeth will have to reign for very much longer to surpass the the length of the reign of the ruler of a non-sovereign state - King Sobhuza II of Swaziland, now eSwatini,whose reign lasted 82 years and 254 days from 1899 to 1982. To beat King Sobhuza she will have to live to the age of 107 which is not an impossible feat in this modern era. 

  As well as the four sovereign states mentioned above, Elizabeth II is also Queen of Jamaica (independent since 1962 - her 59 and 182 day reign there also makes her the 14th longest reigning monarch of a sovereign state in history), Bahamas, Antigua And Barbuda, St Christopher And Nevis, Saint Lucia, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, St Vincent And The Grenadines, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu and Belize. She is of course also monarch of a number of Overseas Territories, Associated States and Crown Territories and has been The Head of The Commonwealth since her succession on 6 February 1952.  We must therefore expect a good number of issues from various Commonwealth philatelic entities to be released during the course of this Jubilee year which are either intended to celebrate and commemorate her achievements or, no doubt in the case of some dubious philatelic agencies producing items in the names of their ‘clients’, to simply cash in on the enthusiasm for the notable and historic anniversary.

New issues.

🇬🇧 Royal Mail - 

4 February 2022 - Platinum Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II - 8 stamps, 1 Prestige booklet containing 4 panes including the first pane which is made up of 8 Machin Head definitives (2x2p), 2x10p, 2x50p and 2x£1.50p, code MPIL M21L), sold for £19.50p, one limited edition Prstige Booklet with the same contents but a different cover in an edition of 1952 and sold for £49.50p and 2 platinum ‘replica’ stamps containing ‘at least 0.1 grams of platinum’ each sold for £125 in editions of 500 (not valid for postage).

  Designed by Kate Stephens using some extremely well chosen photographs and lithographed by International Security Printers and perforated 14.5. Rating:- *****.

🇮🇪 An Post (Republic of Ireland) -

3 February 2022 - ‘Love’ - 1 self-adhesive stamp sold in booklets of 10 costing €11. Designed by Alan Dunne and lithographed by Enschedé and perforated 10.5. Inconsequential and unnecessary. Rating:- *.

1552. 🇸🇿 Small Mammals Feature On 2018 Eswatini Set.

🇸🇿 Depicted below are 2 sets of stamps with accompanying miniature sheets issued by the postal service of Eswatini during 2018. As yet, there does not appear to have been any new stamps issued by the Eswatini postal service during 2019. 

  The first set is a delightful issue of 4 stamps with an accompanying miniature sheet which includes the 4 stamps on the subject of Small Mammals of Eswatini. The date of issue was 31 August 2018. Rating:- *****.

30 April 2019 - 50th anniversary of Independence and 50th Birthday of King Mswati III. I first mentioned this issue in Blog 1292 and assumed that it was issued in August 2018 but a first day cover is dated 30 April 2018. Additionally I was not aware previously that the set of 4 stamps had been accompanied by a single-stamp miniature sheet. Rating:- *****.

🇫🇯 Fiji Post has released 2 further sets of 4 stamps during 2019. While illustrations of the stamps are shown below I do not yet have many detail# of these issues:- 

20 May 2019 - Centenary of the International Labour Organisation - 4 stamps. Rating:- ***.

2019 (date of issue not yet known) - Grouper fish - 4 stamps  (please note that the garbled inscription on the illustration of the 40c is a problem with the illustration and is not how it appears on the real stamp). Rating:- ****.

🇲🇲 The postal service of Myanmar will issue the final part of its Months of the Myanmar Calendar series on 27 November 2019, this time depicting the Myanmar Literature Festival and the Bulbophyllum auricomum flower. Another excellent stamp. Rating:- *****.

1210. 🇬🇧🇸🇿 Gibbons Intoduces A 'Supplementary Appendix' And KingMswati Introduces eSwatini.

  🇬🇧 The editor of the Stanley Gibbons Stamp Catalogues has revealed that he has created a 'Supplementary Appendix' in the new 4th edition of Stanley Gibbons East Africa Catalogue to accommodate stamps which were originally placed in the Appendix section of the catalogue but have subsequently been found, sometimes years after their original issue date, to have actually been sold in post offices and to have received genuine postal usage.

  Mr Jefferies states that, "The listing uses temporary numbers and is unpriced as we are sure that there will be a great many more stamps to add to it".

  It's a difficult problem for the editor. He mentions that, "In recent weeks I have heard that Antigua And Gibraltar, to name but two, do not sell anything but definitives in their post offices" and questions whether or not "we should cease to list all their special issues". In reply to that one, I say that if the stamps are not being sold with the primary intention of their being used on mail, then they are 'Collectables' first and foremost and not true 'postage stamps' and therefore should be listed in the Appendix, so that collectors know that they exist but do not feel pressured to buy them just because they have a catalogue number.

  In all events, the status of new issues seems to have taken a very complicated turn when one now has 3 sections of a catalogue - main list with numbers, appendix and a supplementary appendix. I think it emphasises the point that 'completion', 'one of everything', is impossible in this modern day and age and wouldn't make for a very nice collection even if one did  have the inclination and money to pursue such a goal. Collectors should ensure that they know what they're collecting and make it clear in their mind about what they want to get out of a collection and not feel as though they have to follow a catalogue listing which is generally based on someone else's opinion and nothing more. That way leads to being able to derive maximum pleasure from one's collection and not to gloom which is associated with a collection full of stuff one's not interested in nor doesn't like.

  🇸🇿 King Mswati III, the absolute ruler of what up to now has been known as Swaziland, declared on 18 April 2018 that thenceforth the country would be known by a new name - The Kingdom Of eSwatini. Presumably this will have philatelic consequences, possibly an overprint of the new name on the current definitive series which depicts Trees and dates back to as long ago as 2007 so e-Swatini's postal service may wish to release a completely new definitive series without bothering with overprints. Presumably too all future stamp issues will be inscribed with the new country name including the set due on 6 September 2018 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the country's achievement of Independence. Time will tell.

  🇹🇷 The postal service of The Turkish Republic Of Northern Cyprus released its first stamp issue of 2018 on 6 April in the form of 2 values from the 'Struggle against Cancer' set of 2015 with surcharges applied to them. Rating:- **.

  🇬🇧 Royal Mail has commemorated the celebrations in Stratford upon Avon which mark the anniversary of the playwright's birth which take place this weekend by adorning a postbox in the town with quotations from some of Shakespeare's works. It's interesting for tourists to see and doesn't cost stamp collectors a penny. A free commemorative you might say.