Postage Dues

Within a short time of the beginning of the Ethiopian posts, the consequences of it being a private venture, funded by European investors were evident. Those who had put money into the business wanted some return. There was never going to be a big profit from postage in Ethiopia, but there was certainly a demand for new and more unusual stamp issues amongst stamp collectors around the world.

The 1896 postage due issues, shown on this page, were perhaps never used in Ethiopia itself, yet their sale and distribution to philatelists and dealers in Europe was officially authorised. From the large numbers of the 1894/5 issue that were printed and retained in Paris, the first of many overprints in the next decade were produced.

Notice that the 3 higher values have the same portrait of Menelik II as the lower values, in contrast to the plain first issue stamps. This was because the higher value portrait types were surplus, having been printed due to a miscommunication with the printers in 1894. This emerges another of the “series of unfortunate circumstances” that characterise the slightly chaotic nature of the early history of the Ethiopian posts.