Finland 1856 First Issue 5 Kopeck Tete-beche Pair

A grand duchy's first stamps

Finland had been part of Sweden until the Peace Treaty of Hamina of September 17, 1809, when it was annexed by Russia and became an autonomous Grand Duchy of the Russian Empire. That is why its first stamps were priced in Russian kopecks rather than the later Finnish markka.

The first Finnish stamps, nicknamed 'soikiomerkit,' or oval stamps, were 5 and 10 kopeck values put into use on March 1, 1856, according to most sources; one reference gives March 3, 1856. The design shows the Finnish coat of arms, with seven stars in the shield, above two post horns inside an oval. The 5 kopeck was printed in indigo blue and the 10 kopeck in a red known as alizarin red.

The dies were cut by the Swedish medal engraver Karl Magnus Mellgren, who had also made the dies for the oval stamps printed on Finland's stamped envelopes of 1850. The adhesive stamps carry small changes that set them apart from stamps cut from envelopes. The oval stamps stayed valid until January 31, 1860, and in 1860 they were replaced by a new, smaller design with a crowned coat of arms, separated by serpentine roulette.

One stamp at a time

The oval stamps were made by a primitive method. Staff of the state treasury office struck each stamp individually onto the paper on a simple hand-stamping machine. Sheets had two horizontal rows of ten stamps. When the first row was done, the paper was turned around and the second row printed, so each stamp in the bottom row stood upside down to the one above it. Philatelists call such a pair tete-beche, French for 'head to tail.'

The stamps were printed on porous paper and had no perforations; they were cut apart irregularly by hand. Genuine stamps measure about 28 mm wide by 24 mm tall. There are two main types: one with small 'pearls,' the clappers in the post horns, and one with large pearls. The blue 5 kopeck was modified in 1858 to the large-pearl type. Further printings followed in 1857 and 1859.

The 5 kopeck had a printing of 235,000, of which 138,500 were sold while it was valid; the rest was destroyed by burning. The 10 kopeck had a printing of 602,000, with 442,439 sold.

Fabergé's pairs

Unused tete-beche pairs are among the great rarities of Finnish philately. Fewer than ten are known of each value. In 1932 Agathon Fabergé said he could prove that every unused tete-beche pair in collectors' hands came from one and the same source; who first found that source remains a mystery.

Agathon Fabergé, born in 1876, was the second son of the jeweler Peter Carl Fabergé. Under the Bolsheviks he spent more than a year in a camp as a 'bourgeois counter-revolutionary.' He fled the Soviet Union in 1927 and settled in Finland, where he lived until his death in Helsinki on October 20, 1951. Besides Finland, he formed a leading collection of Russian Zemstvo stamps.

This pair was originally part of a block of four in Fabergé's collection as it stood in 1939. Described as one of the finest unused examples with small pearls, with original gum, it sold for $42,500 at a 'Rarities of the World' auction on May 19, 2001. One account gives the date as May 18.

Its 10 kopeck counterpart is even rarer in block form. A unique unused 10 kopeck block of four containing two tete-beche pairs, ex-Mertens, Fabergé, Lichtenstein and Amundsen, sold for $170,000 in May 2008. A 2023 study of the oval-issue tete-beches, published in a limited edition of 100 copies, records 68 tete-beche items and lists owners that include Fabergé, Philipp von Ferrary, Arthur Hind, Théodore Champion, Alfred F. Lichtenstein and Alfred H. Caspary.

How to recognize one

A genuine pair shows two oval 5 kopeck stamps in blue, one inverted relative to the other, on porous paper, with no perforations. The small-pearl type marks the earlier printings; the large-pearl type dates from 1858.

Reprints are a trap. The oval stamps were reprinted in 1861 (for the Belgian dealer Jean-Baptiste Moens), 1871, 1881, 1892 and 1956, and the 1861-1881 reprints were struck on a lever press like the originals and include tete-beche pairs. The 1956 reprints are watermarked. Forgeries tend to be on compact white paper rather than the porous original paper, and often show 'scissor lines' at the edges, which do not occur on genuine stamps.

Used tete-beche pairs exist too, and some are notable for their cancellations. One 5 kopeck pair in a dark blue shade, ex-Fabergé, is described as probably the only tete-beche pair with an identified postmaster's cancellation, from Tavastehus.

The numbers

Issue date

March 1, 1856 (one source: March 3)

Face value

5 kopecks

Color

Indigo blue

Printing

Hand-struck one at a time; dies by Karl Magnus Mellgren

Sheet

Two rows of ten, second row inverted

Paper

Porous paper, no perforations

Size

About 28 x 24 mm per stamp

Quantity

235,000 printed, 138,500 sold

Unused tete-beche pairs known

Fewer than ten of each value

Validity

To January 31, 1860

Timeline

1. Sep 17, 1809

   The Peace Treaty of Hamina: Finland passes from Sweden to Russia as an autonomous Grand Duchy.

2. 1850

   Finland issues stamped envelopes with oval stamps from Mellgren's dies.

3. Mar 1, 1856

   The 5 and 10 kopeck oval stamps are put into use (one source gives March 3).

4. 1857

   A further printing of the oval stamps.

5. 1858

   The blue 5 kopeck is modified to the large-pearl type.

6. 1859

   Another printing of the oval stamps.

7. Jan 31, 1860

   The oval stamps lose their validity.

8. 1860

   A new, smaller design with serpentine roulette replaces the ovals.

9. 1861

   The first reprints are made, for the Belgian dealer Jean-Baptiste Moens.

10. 1927

    Agathon Fabergé flees the Soviet Union and settles in Finland.

11. 1932

    Fabergé says all unused tete-beche pairs came from a single source.

12. 1939

    This pair is part of a block of four in Fabergé's collection.

13. Oct 20, 1951

    Agathon Fabergé dies in Helsinki.

14. 1956

    Watermarked reprints of the oval stamps are made.

15. May 19, 2001

    The pair sells for $42,500 at auction.

16. May 2008

    The unique unused 10 kopeck tete-beche block of four sells for $170,000.

17. 2023

    A study recording 68 oval-issue tete-beche items is published.

The world in 1856

• Jan 29, 1856

  Queen Victoria institutes the Victoria Cross.

• Mar 30, 1856

  The Treaty of Paris ends the Crimean War.

• May 6, 1856

  Sigmund Freud is born.

• Jul 10, 1856

  Nikola Tesla is born.

• Aug 1856

  Neanderthal remains are found in the Neander Valley in Prussia.

• Oct 8, 1856

  The Second Opium War begins with the Arrow Incident.

• Nov 4, 1856

  James Buchanan is elected the 15th U.S. president.

Price record

A realized auction price is what a buyer actually paid on the date shown, including the buyer's premium where the sale reported it. It is the strongest kind of reference price, and it is a record of one sale of one object on one day, not a promise of what the next example will bring.

By reference price, Finland 1856 First Issue 5 Kopeck Tete-beche Pair is number 56 of 100 in the stamps entries of the FLOAT 100. 82 of those 100 rest on a realized sale; the rest carry an asking price or a guide value, and each page says which. Rank within the FLOAT 100 itself (76 here) is editorial: how much an object defines its field, not price alone.

Did you know

• Every sheet of Finland's first stamps contained upside-down pairs, because the paper was turned halfway through printing.
• Each stamp was struck individually by hand.
• The 5 kopeck stamps that did not sell were burned.
• The collector behind this pair was the second son of the jeweler Peter Carl Fabergé.
• Agathon Fabergé claimed in 1932 that every unused tete-beche pair traced back to a single source.
• Official reprints made as late as 1881 also contain tete-beche pairs, so provenance matters.