Big Blue 1840-1940

A is for Aden and Z is for Zanzabar

Saturday, April 11, 2026

Tunisia - Bud's Big Blue

1888-92 Tunisia in Bud's Big Blue

Bud's Big Blue

Bud's Observations

(From Jim: Bud is well, but has a lot of non philatelic obligations and responsibilities at the moment. With his permission, I will upload country pages in his complete '69 Big Blue that so far has not been shown. He might add his observations later. Enjoy!)

Jim's Observations

The French Protectorate of Tunisia encompasses the years 1881-1956.

By May 12, 1881, French forces occupied Tunisia, and required Bey Muhammad III as-Sadiq to agree to grant a French protectorate through the Bardo Treaty. Although Tunisia was nominally independent (with France acting as a protectorate), the reality was Tunisia essentially became a French colony.

Stamps with the "Bey Coat of Arms" were introduced in July 1, 1888.

The 2014 Scott Classic Specialized 1840-1940 catalogue has, for Tunisia 1888-1938 (-46), 336 major descriptive numbers. Of those, 221 are CV <$1-$1+, or 66%. Clearly, Tunisia is affordable for WW collectors.

During the period covered by this blog, Tunisia was a French protectorate, so naturally the stamps produced are from a French perspective. Fortunately, unlike some European countries who produced stamps for colonies (and protectorates), the stamps have mostly designs reflecting the local scenes, buildings, historical ruins, and people. Because of that, I found Tunisian stamps to be quite delightful.

Big Blue '69, on five pages, has 151 spaces for the regular, postage due, air post, semi-postal, and parcel post categories. Coverage is 45%.

There are only three "expensive" stamps required.

Overall, BB does a nice job for a "representative" selection for Tunisia. One could argue that the semi-postal 1918 surcharge stamps (Scott B12-B14), the semi-postal 1923 surcharged stamps (Scott B20-B28), and some of the 1888-97 perforated "T" postage stamps could of had spaces, perhaps.

The 1926-46 long definitive pictorial set spaces is, of course, short, as the post 1940 issued stamps (33 stamps) are not given a space. But, a number of them do have a space in the Part II 1840-49 International album.

For more on the history and the stamps themselves, click on the link below.

Tunisia Blog Post & BB Checklist

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Supplements

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Tuesday, April 7, 2026

Tripolitania - Bud's Big Blue

1923 Tripolitania in Bud's Big Blue

Bud's Big Blue

Bud's Observations

Jim's Observations

Tripolitania, located in North Africa on the Mediterranean Sea, and including the important coastal city of Tripoli, is historically part of western Libya.

taly captured the Ottoman Tripolitania Vilayet (province) during the Italo-Turkish War in 1911. The sub-provinces (sanjaks) at the time were Fezzan, Cyrenaica, and the city of Tripoli. Altogether, they made up what became known as Italian North Africa (1912-1927), then Italian Libya (1934).

WW I interrupted the occupation, and the Italians were left with Tripoli, Derna, and the coast of Cyrenaica. Control of the interior of Libya was tenuous at best until the mid-1920s to 1931.

The Italians sent colonists in large numbers to Tripolitania in order to better secure the country. By 1939, there were 60,000 Italians in Tripolitania, mostly in Tripoli.

The Capital was Tripoli, and the population was 570,000 in 1921.

Stamps of Italy were overprinted "Tripolitania" beginning on October 24, 1923. (Cyrenaica also had an overprint at the same time.)

Initially the Italian occupied areas were administered as a single colony, but Tripolitania became a separate colony on June 26, 1927.

Stamps were issued for Tripolitania until 1934.

The 2014 Scott Classic Specialized 1840-1940 catalogue has, for Tripolitania 1923-1934, 154 major descriptive numbers for the categories of regular (64), semi-postal (33), air post (43), air post semi-postal (10), air post semi-postal official (1), air post special delivery (2), and authorized delivery (1). Of those, 26 are CV <$1-$1+, or only 17%. Raising the bar to CV $5+, yields 91 total, or 59%.

Of interest, "unused" is almost always much less CV than "used" in the Scott catalogue. That would argue, in my view, that these issues were not really needed much by the colonies (they are much rarer genuinely used). Rather, these stamps were sold mainly to collectors.

BTW, "fake" cancels on "used" stamps are common.

Clearly, Tripolitania ( and Italian colonies in general) are moderately expensive to expensive for the general WW classical era collector who wishes a "representative" collection. And, if one is collecting with the Big Blue album, which has a very generous selection indeed for Tripolitania (and Italian colonies on general), the expense outlay rises further.

Big Blue '69, on seen pages, has 119 spaces for the stamps of Tripolitania. The categories covered include regular, semi-postal, air post, and air post semi-postal groupings. Total coverage is 77%.

The coverage is astonishingly high for a "representative" album, compounded by the fact that the CV for Tripolitania is often moderately expensive to expensive.

The spaces coverage in BB for Italian colonies in general is also high, as I have mentioned before. If one obtains BB feeder albums, one will note that the Italian colonies page sections are invariably quite empty. The challenge for a BB collector is the thousands of dollars in Italian colonies CV that would need to be acquired in order to "fill" a BB album. I think the over generous Italian colonies coverage in BB is a big stumbling block for anybody that would like to "fill" a BB album. For myself, I know that I do not want to spend my entire stamp budget for several years on Italian colonies in order to complete those spaces in BB. And I can't help but feel that these issues did not, for the most part, serve a real postal need, but rather to milk the collector.

There are twenty-two spaces that require a CV $10+ stamp, and one space that requires a CV $30+ stamp.

A not small number of the rest of the spaces require stamps in the ~ CV $4-$6 range.

For more on Tripolitania, click on the link below.

Tripolitania Blog Post & BB Checklist

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