Danzig Overprints: Genuine or Forgery?

 i have  a few Danzig overprints, although (as i remember) most are like the bottom 2 stamps, instead of the more  "stylized logo"

of course could be forgeries for all i know if for nothing else, more examples , good , bad, and/or the ugly

And I have nove with the stylized Danzig, closest is bottom left and it's not really the same, being an actual Danzig stamp

Beryllium Guy,

I'll send you a link to a reference that might help. It's tough to tell on many of these without a much closer look at the overprints.

That being said, I'd be very leery of this lot. There are several obvious fakes, in that they are overprints on values/colors that never existed — the 5 Pf brown and 10 Pf orange at the bottom of the last pic, the 5 Pf brown and 40 Pf with blue overprint (op should be red) at the top of the first pic, etc.

Postmaster, thank you very much for your response.  I would be very grateful to receive a link to a reference.  I agree that the poor quality photos do not help much.  I have asked the dealer to send an actual scan or better photos, but I am not holding my breath on that.

One comment I can respond to is what I have made bold and underlined above.  These are actually mentioned in Scott as  "not regularly issued" along with the 40pf lake and black, which is not in that second lot (542).  The stated value is still pretty high, though, for unissued stamps.  Here is the excerpt from the 2008 Classic Specialized:



Overall, as both you and khj point out, I am more concerned about the presence of the script overprinted stamps that are not listed in either Scott or Gibbons, which I have identified as:

Lot 511:  5pf brown, 40pf carmine rose, 75pf red violet, 80pf blue violet, and what looks to be a 60pf olive green mostly underneath the lot label.  None of these are listed as being overprinted with this design in either catalogue.
Lot 542:  The only unlisted ones in this group are the two mentioned above as "not regularly issued".

But I am also troubled by the fact that on the high CV items like the 30pf orange & black, 50pf purple & black, and 60pf magenta, the postmarks are either straight bars or have no legible place name.  That said, I did compare as best I could the script overprint to the genuine vs. forgery on the website I mentioned, and most of the overprints I could discern seemed to appear more like the genuine version shown on the web page.

The dealer is not going for huge money on these, as starting bids are £60 (about US $75) on each lot.  So, the question is, would it be worth it to take a flyer on these and hope that one or two of the high-value ones turn out to be genuine?  If even a couple of the high CV ones turned out to be real, they would more than justify the asking price.

Thanks to all of you who responded.  More opinions are still welcome, of course!

Great thread Chris, thanks for starting it.

That link is excellent Ryan, thanks a lot. I had no idea there are so many forgeries on these. I've downloaded the pdf's for later reference. At this point I am thinking this would be too detailed a study for a generalist like myself, still useful in case I should!

Good luck with your 'homework' Chris, this study will keep you busy 

Well, it is not so satisfactory i must say...
Do you want a full warranty on your purchase? Ok, but then don't pay 75$...
When you buy something, you must be aware what you're buying... A hidden fault can always occur, but can we speak of a hidden fault on such a stamp? No, because we know at the beginning the stamp is not warranted... So, my opinion is: 95% of not warranted high catalog value overprints is a forgery. Do you want to purchase it? Purchase it like a forgery (and pay it like a forgery...)

First of all, thanks again to all members who responded to my request for opinions: PostmasterGS, khj, Ryan, ameis33, blaamand, salentin, and vikingeck (by PM).  I made an open request for opinions, and I got that, so thanks!

What I am mostly looking for, though, is technical information about the stamps.  Yes, of course, I understand that I can attempt to negotiate a better deal than £60 ($75) per card, but only if no one else offers the opening bids.  These are items in an auction.  It's really too bad that this is not a live auction, as I could really see if there is other interest.

A little unexpectedly, I did get some new photos from the dealer again today.  An added point of interest is that many, or perhaps all, of the stamps in Lot 511 have an expertizing mark on them.  As the validity of expertizing marks is a broader topic than Danzig overprints on their own, I think I will post the new info pertaining to the expertizing in a different thread, which may encourage other members to participate.

I am still undecided about these Danzig stamps, but I am mulling over a couple of options.  Luckily, the dealer said that I can submit my bids by email closer to the auction time on Sunday, so I don't need to rush to put a written bid into the post after all.  That gives me a few more days to review what I know and try to develop a possible strategy.

I will take a look to see if a thread on expertizing marks already exists, and either post my findings there or start another new thread shortly.

Stay tuned! 

Expertizing marks get forged as well. Certificates are better, but yes, certificates get forged as well, and not every experitizer will provided online database of genuine certificates. Please post the expertizing marks. Check out the filatelia website as well for the expertizer marks.

The link for Filatelia Philatelic Experts site map.

I haven't kept up with the rules regarding outside links.  I assume this one is allowed.  Apologies if I have violated any rules.

Thanks for your kind offer, Mike (mikeclevenger ).  I will send what I have by email, but just to warn you, they are only photos, not scans.  And the quality is not great.  I was really struggling to see much detail.

Overall Update
The better news on this is that I have shared my info with the dealer, and he has decided to remove these two lots from the auction, and he will sell them to me at a greatly reduced price as forgeries.  So, within the next week or so, I should have the stamps in hand, and I will do some proper scans with enough detail to see what's going on.