Stamp Conditions and Definitions

MINT STAMPS

Unmounted Mint - Never mounted - perfect gum

VLM - Very Lightly Mounted Mint - Full gum, mount has left slight gum disturbance

LMM - Lightly Mounted Mint - full gum, but obvious marks of hinge

Mounted Mint - Some hinge adherence to back of stamp

Heavily Mounted - hinge remains firmly on back of stamp

USED STAMPS

Superb Used - Perfect stamp with part light circular cancel - clear view of front. (These stamps are rare – Less than one in a hundred stamps are in this condition).

Very Fine Used - Perfect stamp with light circular cancel - – (Only possibly one in fifty stamps are in this condition)

Fine Used - Perfect stamp with light/medium circular cancel – (Only possibly one in twenty stamps are in this condition)

Used - Perfect stamp with straight-line, slogan or heavier circular cancel – (Most stamps are this condition)

FDC - First Day Cover - used on first day of issue of the stamps on the cover.

Souvenir Cover - Special handstamp used on special cover, with a particular stamp. This is not normally the first day of a stamp issue and the use of the handstamp sometimes continued over a period.