An Austrian cachet which was subject to controversy

  • For many years researchers tried to understand where the cachet shown below was applied.

    The cachet it is different from others Austrian cachets used at the Ottoman-Austrian boreders.

    As you can see articles were written and in fact there were four alternatives: Semlin, Alt Orshova (Dr Wurth and Leon Gobbles), Schuppanek and Mehadia. The later ones were assigned by Luciano de Zanche, Denis and Klaus Meyer.

    Now it is the time to take a look into the books. Many years ago I had to spend weeks at Vienna to reaserch the libraries. Today I had to research…….Google book. They did and still are doing a great work.

    The Austrians' published yearly books under the name Militar-Schematismus des Osterreischen Kaiserhumes. A chapter, usually at the end of the books, was dedicated to "Contumaz-Anstalten".

    Well I made captures for you from the books printed in different years and no mention of Orshova and Mehadia during the time the cachet was used. I show a few letters from Wallachia sent to Pesth and struck with this cachet. That make clear that it cannot been use at Semlin. The only Contumaz which appears in the books and correspond to the letters dates it is Schuppanek. I gave some different colors to the pages to differentiate the printing years.

    I think that we can attribute this cachet to Schuppanek together with the well known two wax seals.

  • I add an article published in Pratique about this topic.

  • Well done Hedy! The digitisation of rare books will enable us to study at home. I'm also very happy about that.


    I do not know if noticed that Dr. Gertlieb Gmach issued an interesting book in three parts from 2014/16:

    "Österreichische und ungarische Posteinrichtungen in den Donaufürstentümern (Rumänien) : (1782 bis 1880)"

    – 1. Historisches Umfeld, Begriffe, Postwege, Desinfizierung, Postorte, Stempelkunde. - [2014]

    – 2. Konsulatsposttarife, Auslandsposttarife (1836, 1844, 1851) je mit internationalen Korrespondenzen, Postverträge, DDSG, Lloyd. - [2015]

    – 3. Postverhältnisse in der Zeit um den Krimkrieg ab 1853, Telegrafie, Exkurs zu Krajova, österreichische Währungsreform 1858, auch im internationalen Kontext (z.B. DÖPV, ÖIPV und Risorgimento, fremde Staaten), Soldimarken ab 1864. - [2016]


    I do not have these three books but I lent two of them (part 1 and 2) from the Philatelic Library in Munich some month ago. These books are describing postal routs and the disinfection of mail very detailed. The Austrian cachet you mentioned is also illustrated and it is mentioned that it was used in Schuppanek (Supanek, Zsupanek). The author also stated that the quarantaine station Schuppanek was erected based on an edict of 1775. Especially during the revolutionary movement of Tudor Vladimirescu in 1821/22 Schuppanek was used to disinfect letters because the normal postal route from Constantinople to Vienna via Bucharest was closed and mail was sent via Cernatal.


    Kind regards

    André



    P.S. The author Dr. Gmach is referring to the following article: Cserni, Carantiniele din Transilvania si Banat, Filatelia 2004 (magazine no. 3 and 4)