"PORTUGUESE COLONIES UPU POSTAL STATIONERY ARCHIVES RECEIVING AUTHORITY PROOFS"
The Receiving Authority Specimens are of great philatelic importance, as they provide proof of the UPU's distribution to its members. According to Marcus Samuel, author of the famous book "UPU Receiving Authority Specimen", the best known receiving authority specimen is the ULTRAMAR hand stamp applied to UPU distributions and sent to the Portuguese Ministry. The earliest issues (1895-1910) are hand stamped as ULTRAMAR, in 1925 as COLONIAS, and from 1927-1931 as ESPECIMEN. These were sent in very limited quantities to the Portuguese Archives. When the UPU was abolished, these archives were ordered to be destroyed and very few have survived.
"ULTRAMAR": 1926/36 (ca.), ungebrauchte Partie mit 14 Meter Mark Probedrucken, inkl. Freie Stadt Danzig, mit den Sicherheitsaufdrucken aus dem portugiesischen UPU-Postarchiv für die Kolonien, u.a. "COLONIAS", "ESPECIMEN" und "SPECIMEN", einige etwas fleckig, sonst in guter Erhaltung
